


This One's For You, Blue Rose

by whaleandjanuary



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Additional Warnings In Author's Note, Alternate Universe - College/University, Bondage, Dubious Consent, F/M, Fucking Machines, Not Actually Unrequited Love, Other, Sex Toys, Sex Work, Trans Marianne von Edmund, Virgin Sacrifice, background Claude/Hilda, background claurenz but it's complicated, background possibly-one-sided dimiclaude, some kid of weird magic hypnosis, the dimitri brothel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-19
Updated: 2021-03-27
Packaged: 2021-03-28 17:20:10
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 23,416
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30142929
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whaleandjanuary/pseuds/whaleandjanuary
Summary: College student Dimitri Blaiddyd spends a lot of time not thinking about things. Like his unrelenting crush on fellow student Marianne von Edmund. Or how his part-time job is at an inn which seems to have an inconsistent number of rooms and no guests.He has many other concerns. Like the other half of his part-time job, where he reviews sex toys (rather personally.) Or what his boss will do if they find out he's been exchanging one-on-one messages with the Blue Rose, his favorite fan.Or whether he's ready for his live debut as the Winter Prince, bound to his throne as a sacrifice for the arrival of springtime. At least the Blue Rose should be coming. Maybe the blindfold was a bad idea.--------The House at Red Candle's Light announces its occasional celebration of the Spring Equinox via song and dance, magic and games, and of course the entertainments for which it is most renowned. As always, the night will conclude with a drawing for the affections of the Winter Prince, a Dimitri untouched by another's hand and kept innocent of the nature of the House.
Relationships: Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd/Marianne von Edmund
Comments: 34
Kudos: 35





	1. A Strange Job And a Stranger House

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you eternally to Spiderlily_Writes for reading this and giving me a bunch of good advice. 
> 
> This fic is set in an American-ish college system both because that's the one I know and because the plot is partially driven by student loans. The technology is a mix of early-2000s and modern - there's Animal Crossing on the Switch but no OnlyFans. 
> 
> Marianne is trans. There's no transphobia in this universe. Her friends know and nobody cares except possibly to be happy that she knows herself. 
> 
> Consent - let's talk about Marianne and Dimitri first. Marianne knows about Dimitri's other job long before he knows she knows. They do talk about this fact, and he's ultimately all right with it, but I'm not going to pretend it isn't kind of sketchy. 
> 
> With Dimitri and his job - Dimitri's agreed to everything sexy that happens, and I can tell you as the author that he'd still have agreed if they'd been more open. But they know he needs money and they know exactly how to frame requests and offers so he'll accept them. Also, Mercedes is Doing Something to him that he was _not_ asked for consent on and - it's not sexual but Mercedes is definitely being a creep here and it's partially just for her own amusement. It's a weird magic sex house; stuff's creepy sometimes.
> 
> Ok, phew. If you're still interested, let's get this show on the road.

The thing was, the money was just too good. 

Even at the beginning, when it was just cleaning, when Dimitri thought the Queen Anne-style house really was just a bed-and-breakfast, it was a generous wage. 

It was too good to pass up. He could do the whole job outside of class hours, and the pay covered his textbooks and food, and would help a lot with the rent. Any money he didn't have to borrow was good.

He assumed the job would already be filled by how many tags had been taken from the flyer in the students' center, but he was pleasantly surprised when he called the number. A woman's voice answered, and after asking him his name, and his school, and his year, and a few questions about his schedule, she had him come to the house. 

The interview was short. The owner was a middle-aged woman with a pleasant demeanor and an impressive facial scar. "A car accident when I was younger," she said, before he could think to ask. Like him, sort of. She told him to call her Sadie. She showed him around the house, verified that he could do laundry and make a bed, and hired him. 

At the end of the first week, she paid him in cash. Maybe that should have seemed weird? Maybe the age of the money should have seemed weird? But it wasn't _that_ weird. He probably should have been more weirded out by fact that the rooms needed cleaning despite the general lack of guests. But by the time he noticed it, he was used to it. 

That was how it had all gone, hadn't it? Every step wasn't _that_ weird, or was so small from the last one. All perfectly reasonable requests, everything worth at least _trying_. Always with clearly-stated encouragement to back out if he was uncomfortable. But. Also with compensation discussed frankly, like it was a fair price for anyone and not so much money that any college student would have to say, "Do I care about discomfort?" 

Well, that was why he was here, in the end. Because he was going to cover half a semester's tuition with one night's work. Not because he loved it. Not because he was going to hold a whole room in the palm of his hand, desperate to approach him but forbidden to touch. Not because this was who he was now. Who he had always been? No, it was for the money.

(Lies. But he wasn't going to say _no_ to the money.)

Mercedes leads him onto the stage, gently holding his hand. He's blindfolded - well, really they've just taped up the eye holes in his performing mask. But he can feel the heat of the lights, and he can hear the band growing quieter as the main event arrives. Mercedes whispers that he should open his robe a bit, and backs off somewhere behind him. 

The robe is blue and silver, and made of some cool, silky material. Possibly actual silk - their supplies are strange. Dimitri loosens the belt slightly and lets the fabric fall from his shoulders to his elbows. He holds his arms apart and tilts his head - _Well, isn't this what you came for?_

There is a murmur from the crowd, but it's cut off by Yuri's voice, beautiful and commanding. "Greetings, gentlefolk and unsavories, and welcome on this final night of winter. You know the joke. He _just_ came of age. His birthday was _yesterday_. He's never done _any_ of this before. Well, if you're here you've probably seen the videos, so you know that last statement's a lie." 

The audience laughs, and Yuri continues. "And he's twenty-one, so if that's too old for any of you perverts, don't let the door hit you on the way out." A beat. "Unless you're into that sort of thing. What I can tell you truly is that you're his first live in-person audience and he's never seen this chair before. Sorry, sorry." Dimitri can imagine Yuri's smile. "His _throne_." 

(True. Technically true, although he'd _felt_ it once in testing.) 

"Now, we have attendants going around with tickets if you want to be entered into any of the drawings. I'll point especially at the drawing to play the role of Spring. One lucky winner _will_ be allowed to touch, so consider what you'd be willing to contribute for the chance to put your hands _or other body parts_ on the Winter Prince." 

Dimitri puts his fingertips on his chin and draws them down his throat and chest. Someone whistles. 

Yuri's voice comes more clearly - he must have turned to face Dimitri. "Well, Your Highness? Your kingdom is waiting." 

Dimitri smirks, and drops the robe to the ground, and the crowd cheers. 

It's not just the money.

============

Marianne had been much more aware than Dimitri that something strange was going on with his job. She brought it up back at the beginning, while they were having tea one afternoon in the residence dining room.

Marianne and Dimitri had joined the same living group during freshman year and bonded over similar mental health problems and a particularly terrible math class. They often sat together and drank tea or hot chocolate when they had a break between classes, like a fun little date. (But not really a date, because Dimitri was not going to ruin this friendship by hitting on his beautiful, kind, shy friend, with her small smiles and secret laughs and _they were very good friends_.) 

"Why do they have you cleaning the rooms in the early evening?" she asked him. "I thought hotels had checkout at ten or eleven." 

He stared into his tea. "I don't know. She said I could come by after classes when she hired me." 

"And the guests don't mind having to get out of their rooms for you to clean? Some of them have to be there." 

"Actually ..." What he was about to say hadn't seemed weird until just now, and that worried him slightly. "I've never seen anybody there except the manager." 

Marianne frowned. "Then why are you cleaning the rooms every day?" 

Dimitri took a sip of tea just to gain a few seconds to think. "But the rooms _need_ cleaning. Stuff's been moved around. The sheets are, ah, they need cleaning. The beds have been slept in." And sometimes he found lost articles of clothing. And once there was blood on the bedsheets, although not "someone was murdered here" amounts. 

They were both silent for a minute. Dimitri's brain unhelpfully supplied, "Sexy ghost inn?" but it wasn't worth saying out loud. 

Marianne eventually asked, "You told me it was a bed and breakfast. What was its name again?" 

"Uh, Chamomile and Lace." 

They stared at each other. Then Marianne put a hand in front of her mouth and burst into giggles. 

"Dimitri ... are you cleaning a sex club?"

============

There is a story to the show, about the Prince and the kingdom of eternal winter. Upstairs, where the non-VIPs are, there's a similar show playing out via song and dance. Someone with the same mask but who has professional ballet experience is at the center of that show, and Dimitri wonders if the people upstairs know it's not him. That must be where Marianne and Claude and Hilda are, right? This show was invite-only.

Down here, in the semi-darkness, Yuri narrates the story of the Winter Prince and his sacrifice. 

"Once upon a time, there was a small kingdom where winter settled in and never left. The spirits of snow and ice, of wind and darkness, blanketed the land, and the people did not know whether they would freeze first, or starve. 

"The Prince of the kingdom, who loved his people dearly and wanted to see them safe and warm and most importantly, alive, sought out the spirits and struck a bargain with them. If he could remain seated upon his throne, alone, for the entire night, they would depart his kingdom. 

"The Prince secured from them a further stipulation that they would not touch him directly, lest the wind rip him from the chair and render the entire ordeal meaningless. The spirits agreed, because they liked a bit of fun and had no intention of honoring their deal anyway." 

Mercedes hands Dimitri a ring gag. He's meant to be heard. Dimitri holds the ring up to his mouth, licks his tongue around the cold metal circle. Someone cheers. (Perhaps in a sense it is the Winter Prince who does all this; Dimitri tries to keep some separation in his mind between the two. But anyway.) Then he fits the gag into his mouth and buckles it behind his head. 

Mercedes takes his hands again and leads him to the chair. He's already wearing wrist and ankle cuffs, to make the setup easier. They're beautiful, some kind of blue fake leather decorated with silver snowflakes. 

The chair is ... well, as Yuri said he hasn't actually seen it. But he knows that it's not really a _chair_ so much as it is a _machine_ that you can sit on. There's a small backrest, enough that he has something to lean back on. There are metal loops where he can be tied in. And there's the cock attached to the seat, which is what he'll be riding for an indeterminate amount of time tonight. 

Mercedes helps him find his position, bringing his hands to the backrest so he can hold onto it. Then she steps behind him and guides his hips down. 

He's prepared for this as much as possible. They did a test run two days ago but he didn't have to look attractive then. He fingered himself open half an hour ago and he and the dildo are both slick but it still feels enormous. He stops to breathe with the tip barely inside. 

Mercedes is very gently pulling him down. "Just relax. Let me help you." 

He tries to say, "Let me adjust first," but he gets as far as "ehhhh" and remembers he can't talk. Mercedes can't really pull him down against his will, but she exerts a steady force with both her hands and her voice. He sighs and slowly works his way down towards the seat.

Yuri's telling the crowd about the machine and its various intimidating settings. Dimitri is only half listening; the blood's rushing in his ears and he needs to focus on breathing. He can already tell this is not the same cock they used for the test run. Dimitri _hopes_ Yuri's description is an exaggeration. He's perfectly capable of acting like he's being railed to within an inch of his life. He doesn't need to literally experience it. 

Finally his ass hits the chair and he drops his head forward and pants. He's already drooling, but that's too low on the list of concerns to matter. He knows that in a minute he'll go from _what is inside me?!_ to _all right, move already_ , but the transition is always a little nerve-wracking. 

Yuri's narration gently rolls over him again. 

"The Prince knew the spirits would try all manner of tricks to entice or frighten him into standing, so he had his servants bind him to the throne. He also had them cover his eyes so that he could not see whatever horrors the spirits would conjure. And then they left, and he was alone. 

"But not for long, because soon he heard the wicked laughter of snow and ice, of wind and darkness, and the throne room was filled with vicious cheers." 

There's silence, and Yuri says, "Well? It looks like our Winter Prince is having some trouble and we've barely started. Let's encourage him!" 

Dimitri snaps his head up as a round of raucous applause starts. His face goes hot, but at least the mask will partially hide his blush. 

He hears Mercedes close to his ear. "They love you. You're going to be fine." She rubs his hands as she brings them down and clips the cuffs to the chair. His arms are slightly behind him so his chest is on full display, but not so far back as to strain him. And he can grip the edges of the seat from here, which is good. 

She bends one of his legs, then the other, and locks them into place as well. The position - knees raised and legs spread - pushes him into the backrest. Anybody who wants to get a good look at his cock (which is, hopefully, everyone here) is in luck. If he lifts himself off the chair at all they'll have a perfect view of the dildo disappearing into his ass. 

He still feels a bit of shame, but he's so turned on by thoughts of the audience's desire that it doesn't matter. All those people looking, wishing it was _their_ hands holding him down, _their_ cock driving into him. Their fingers holding his mouth open while his spit drips down his chin onto his chest. And none of them are allowed to touch. 

Well, one person would be. But Dimitri would be imagining someone else. 

He feels something around his waist. Mercedes is putting a belt on him? It feels like the same material as the cuffs. He hears a chain moving and feels a brief tug at the back, but it doesn't keep pulling. 

"Now our Prince is no _coward_ ," Yuri says, "but we don't want him running away. Darling Prince, lift yourself up and show these good people how much you can move."

Oh. Oh that's ... of course. He pushes himself up on his hands, and he can only get his ass up a few inches before the chain is taut. Realistically, this isn't a problem, since if he actually got all the way off the dildo while it was moving he'd probably hurt himself. But it's a little frightening knowing how thoroughly trapped he is. 

"As you can see, he has the choice between straining his arms and being very fucked, or resting and being _extremely_ fucked. But either way he isn't going anywhere until _we_ are done with him." Scattered laughter. "And aren't you all very hungry?" More cheers. 

Dimitri lowers himself back down with a groan. How is he going to manage this? He's already so hard it's on the edge of painful. 

Someone's ruffling his hair - he thinks it's Mercedes at first but it turns out to be Yuri. "Any last words, Winter Prince?" 

Dimitri whimpers, and it's much louder than he expects; Yuri must be holding the microphone to his mouth. 

"I think he's hoping you'll save him, Blue Rose!" More laughter. "But that's enough foreplay for anyone, hm? Let's get this started for real." 

Yuri switches back to his narrator voice. "As the Prince began his long night, he learned quickly that he had made a mistake. Because while the spirits had promised not to touch him directly, they had made no such agreements about. his. throne." 

There's a humming sound below him, and the dildo starts vibrating. Dimitri gasps; it's a bit of an act, but the audience won't know anything's changed otherwise. 

"Now if I were a kind man, I'd let him warm up with some pleasant vibrations. Mercedes, was he good for you?" 

"Oh, yes, Yuri. He was a very good boy." Dimitri whimpers again. The vibrations feel good but they're already a lot.

"I'm happy to hear it." A beat. Dimitri knows what must be coming but that doesn't help him. "Pity I'm not kind." 

Dimitri screams as the cock thrusts into him.

============

One morning, Marianne asked Dimitri how his job was going. They were grabbing a quick breakfast before heading to campus. Claude was the only other person in the dining room, huddled over a bowl of cereal and an organic chemistry textbook at another table. He was likely having dinner, or possibly lunch - Claude's schedule couldn't be measured by petty human devices like clocks or calendars.

"Have you seen any actual guests yet?" she asked him.

"Yes, finally," he replied. "Actually, a couple. Younger than I expected; I sort of assumed this would be an old people vacation thing." 

There had been something weird, or familiar, or weirdly familiar, about the couple walking down the hall, although he'd only seen them from the back. They were two blonde people, and the woman reminded him a little bit of his friend Ingrid from high school? But no matter. There _were_ people in the house sometimes. 

Marianne grimaced. "I hope the owner's doing this as a retirement hobby and not because she needs the money. One room booked over how many days over - how many rooms is it?" 

Dimitri thought. "Six or eight. Maybe ten?" 

"How do you not know?"

Dimitri turned. Claude was staring at them. "Hm?" 

"Isn't your job to clean the bedrooms? How do you not know how many rooms it is?" 

Dimitri gestured with his hands, trying to indicate the structure of the house. "Well, I just sort of clean until I'm done. There are the rooms on the first floor past the sitting room, and everything on the second floor hallway, and the room in the attic tower. And, um ..." He waved a hand in a circle. "The, um, the other bit. I don't know how to describe it." 

Marianne and Claude were both looking at him with skepticism. 

He shrugged, a little embarrassed. "I can make a circuit through the house and when I get back to the office I'm done. I zone out and listen to music; I don't think about it too hard while I'm there." He did get lost occasionally, he supposed.

Claude raised an eyebrow. "This seems like an implausibly large house, but whatever. I'm not an architect." 

After the next time he went to work, Dimitri reported that it was, in fact, eight bedrooms. 

(The time after that, there were nine, but he thought, "Ah, I must have miscounted before," and didn't ponder further.)

(The time after that, it was six, but he was no longer counting.)

============

Sadie had a cup of tea and some cookies waiting for him every time he came by the house, black tea with cream and sugar. It wasn't his favorite sort; he was really an herbal tea sort of person. But it vaguely reminded him of drinking tea when visiting his nana as a small child, and that was a pleasant nostalgia. The cookies were usually cinnamon. He couldn't taste anything except a bit of the sweetness, but they smelled good and the thought was nice.

The tea was always warm. It was always warm, even to the last sip, which was a neat trick however she managed it. Maybe the cups were more insulated than they looked. 

There was something fundamentally motherly about Sadie. She asked him about his day, and he found himself telling her about his problems with a surprising frankness. He was no longer sure his major was a good idea for him personally, but then what would happen to his father's company? The expectation was that Dimitri would take over once he knew how ... But if he switched to something he liked better, who would keep it running? On the other hand, it wasn't clear the company would still exist by the time he graduated, with the way his uncle seemed to be mismanaging it. Either way, how was he ever going to pay back his student loans? 

And sometimes he talked about Marianne, and how his mind would not let go of his crush despite everything.

"Oh, that's a dilemma," Sadie said. She nibbled a cookie. "And you say the two of you are such good friends. Mm, I think you're doing the right thing. If she was interested in you that way, you'd know. And she's not interested in you that way, is she?" 

Dimitri sighed. "I guess not." 

"Don't worry about it too much, Dimitri. You have a whole life of adventures ahead of you. But ... if you have money worries, there are more things I could have you do around the House? Come back when you're done cleaning for the day and I'll give you more tea and we can talk about it." 

(Things Dimitri did not think about until much later: Whenever she said it, she always capitalized the word "House.")

============

Sadie had almost been apologetic, when she explained what she meant by "more things." She thought he knew. They used the house as a set. The day shoots were before he arrived, and the night shoots after he left.

"It's porn. They make porn there," he told Marianne. 

Marianne was playing Animal Crossing on the big television in the basement. She had wanted to show Dimitri the latest additions to her home. Dimitri didn't have the patience to decorate very well, but he liked seeing what she did. Her island was covered in carefully-cultivated hybrid flowers, and was terraformed to look like a beautiful park. (No, she had told him, she did not know why she was able to keep her island pristine, but her real-life room was a disaster.) 

"Oh!" said Marianne. "I was so close with 'sex club' but not quite." She walked her avatar from the "blue" bedroom to the "cute animals" bedroom. 

"I like your outfit," Dimitri said. "Did you make the pattern yourself?" 

"I did! Um, I'm glad you like it. Are you going to keep the job?" 

"Ah, yes. Well, you see - she's giving me a raise to help disinfect and maintain their supplies." There was no reason to be embarrassed. This was a perfectly reasonable job. 

Marianne turned to look at him, eyes wide. Then a grin spread across her face. "You, Dimitri Blaiddyd, are cleaning the sex toys for a porn studio?" 

Dimitri crossed his arms and stared very hard at the floor. "It was a fifteen percent raise. That's a lot. Also I'm not as innocent as everyone likes to pretend. Just because I'm not Sylvain doesn't mean I don't know what a ... what a butt plug looks like _what is that?_ " 

The basement of Marianne's home was ... creepy, with skeletons, and some kind of stone altar? And a blood-spatter pattern? 

"That's the occult basement where we ritually sacrifice the bad villagers. I, um, I've been talking a lot with Dr. Eisner about my darker feelings, and I thought maybe it would be good to have a fake place to think about them. The attic's a torture chamber." 

"Oh. That's creative! I haven't given Dr. Eisner any more details about my job. I don't have a good reason. Maybe I'm afraid they'll ask me a question and I'll realize I need to quit?" 

He also had extremely not brought up the most recent conversation he'd had with Sadie. About how one of the things they did was toy reviews. And how they were looking for someone who wasn't jaded by experience to do some of them. 

"Do you need to quit? Or think you need to?" Marianne put the controller in her lap and regarded him seriously. 

"I ... hope not. Cleaning is calm work, and the money is good. Maybe I'm afraid it's too good to be true?" Maybe he already knew he was going to say yes to Sadie's offer and he definitely didn't want to discuss _that_. 

Marianne shrugged. "I think it's fun that you're a porn janitor." 

"Oh goddess, _please_ never say that phrase again."

============

_now. the last night of winter._

He comes too quickly the first time. He's supposed to pace himself. Yuri does his best to help; at least twice he tells the audience he's turning the machine up and turns it _down_ instead. Dimitri still shakes like he's going to crack open. 

The audience is eating it up. Everyone's here to watch their Winter Prince melt into a trembling puddle. But that doesn't mean he's supposed to do it immediately. There's an art to this. 

Dimitri had underestimated the effect the crowd was going to have on him. That's his problem. This was the bit they couldn't duplicate during the test run. There's a room full of people here to watch him come, and he _wants_ to please them. 

He pushes himself up slightly so they have a better view. The cock is relentless, like only a machine could be. It's incredible. He's tried several toys that have made him think, "I've never been so turned on before," but this is in a class by itself. 

With his current position, it's hitting his prostate and what he _should_ do is _move_ so he can last longer. What he _does_ do is lean into it and moan, not one of the sounds he's been carefully tossing off but an uncontrolled wild noise. 

He knows this is stupid, that they won't turn the machine off once he comes and it is going to be a bad time, but he _needs to be fucked harder right now_. He drops back onto the chair, pushes himself up, drops again. 

His climax is overwhelming. Sparks dance behind his eyelids, his toes curl, and the sound he makes is like a howl. Waves of pleasure shake his body as he clenches around the toy, as come pulses out of him and splatters his stomach. 

But he's right that they won't turn the machine off. Yuri doesn't even turn it down, the fiend. And it is _too much turn it down_. Yuri has to hear the way his voice rises in pitch even if no words come out. Too much too much - Dimitri jerks his arms and legs but the cuffs are securely held and _please it's too much!_

He just barely makes out Yuri saying, "Who wants to place a bet on how long it is till he's hard again?"


	2. HELLO PRINC3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The introduction of Yuri LeClerc, fabulous instructor, and the Blue Rose, who is quite the fan.

The first time he went to the house to do the new job, the _on-camera_ job, Sadie offered him a mask, because he seemed nervous. 

"It's perfectly normal!" she said, cheerily. "Not everybody wants all their friends and family knowing what they do, even if they're accepting! And there's still a lot of stigma attached to sex work." 

Goddess, this was sex work, wasn't it? There was nothing wrong with it. He was an adult who was making his own choices. 

The mask was blue leather (fake leather, Sadie told him) with silver snowflakes painted onto it. Snow at night. 

She had him film in one of the bedrooms. "I'll just turn the camera on and leave, so you don't have to be nervous. Just give your honest opinion and you can come get me when you're done." 

The plug was clearly something small meant for a beginner, but he still spent five minutes fumbling with it and the lube and his opinion was effectively, "Well, I guess if you like this sort of thing, then you'll like this sort of thing." 

Sadie seemed pleased anyway, and had him try out a few similar toys. (He grew progressively more embarrassed, but he did his best. He wanted to do a good job.) She sent him home with the collection, which he immediately hid in his room and tried to forget about. 

A few days later, she told him that Yuri was going to coach him. (Which ... what?) 

"He's one of our instructors. He's incredible. A true expert and a great teacher." 

"... You have instructors?" Why was he getting a coach? Had he missed a conversation somewhere? 

"Yes! We teach classes some evenings. Dimitri, you should come by. You miss out on so much because you're only here during the off hours." 

Yuri taught him about _putting on a show_. Yuri was also how he found out Sadie's name was Mercedes, although he said it mer-seh-dehs and not mer-say-deez. 

"But Sadie - but Mercedes told me they wanted my honest opinion." Yuri was giving him a lot of information about "holding himself" and "moaning effectively" that seemed at odds with "reviews of sex toys." 

"Oh, that's charming. Look, I have no idea what Mercedes said to you, but you're here because you're a six-foot-tall, blond, athletic, innocent- _looking_ young man. And when I'm done teaching you, everyone who lays eyes on you who is even _slightly_ attracted to men is going to be desperate to drag your face into their lap." Yuri reached out and took Dimitri's chin, tilted his face up. "You blush very prettily." 

Dimitri managed a confused, "Hahh?" 

"It's the whole point of the Winter Prince persona. The untouchable figure you long to corrupt." 

Dimitri remembered how to speak. "The Winter Prince? What?" 

Yuri glared at the door. "I'm going to have words with Mercedes. Why does she delight in never explaining anything?" He sighed. "The snowflake mask. It's the mask of the Winter Prince."

Yuri took in Dimitri's expression. "Let's start over. Hi, I'm Yuri, and I'm here to teach you how to look good while you fuck yourself on camera. Let me know if you need to run screaming so that I can go get lunch." 

Dimitri swallowed heavily, then said, "Ok. Teach me."

============

Yuri said he was a quick learner. He'd taught Dimitri how and when to make a variety of pleased and desperate noises. He'd shown him how to drag his tongue along a dildo so the audience would think, "I wish he was doing that to _me_." How to snap between seductive and innocent and back. How all sorts of things were meant to be used or inserted. How to come with a toy in his ass. How to come _from_ a toy in his ass.

"You have fan mail," Mercedes told him, after a few weeks of posting his videos. "Here's the login information. Answer it at your own risk, but I thought you should be able to see it." 

Dimitri looked at the card. The password was strange - college-9048-pan-charm-taiga-winterprince. It was so long but had no special characters. He'd have to change it to something more secure. 

Looking at his fan mail was a turning point. Before that, he was doing a job for money, and he wanted to do a good job because that's who he was as a person. After, the Winter Prince was doing this because it made him feel powerful, and because attention was glorious, and because a prince's job was to serve his people. 

People were into him. Well, some people were creepy, and he was getting an astonishing number of dick photos, but some were sweet? People messaged him who'd tried out toys he mentioned or wanted to suggest other things to try. Someone drew fanart of the mask. He got all sorts of random questions about his likes and interests. 

"Don't answer the messages," Yuri told him. "Not directly, not there. You should answer some of the questions in your videos. Since you don't do livestreams, it'll give people a way to feel like they're connected with you. And it'll make it clear what sorts of messages are acceptable. Relatedly, forward me any threats of violence so I can have them dealt with."

So he answered questions in his videos. 

"Of course grilled cheese is delicious," he said, stretching his neck so the chains connecting the nipple clamps to the collar went taut. "You can never have too much cheese. But no tomatoes. They have a weird texture."

"Mm, a hundred horse-sized ducks, I think. You can find out why after I take the gag back out." 

"I don't see how the human is successfully fighting off the wolf bare-handed - _ahhhhh_ excuse me a minute." He lowered himself the rest of the way onto the dildo. "The tongue shape is incredible. I'm sorry to say the wolf can eat the person for all I care right now." 

"Someone calling themself Blue Rose wanted to know if it was all right that they were watching my videos, since they weren't a boy." He was sprawled on a bed, lazily stroking himself while the vibrating plug he was showing off buzzed away inside him. "I think they might have been under the impression that I'm gay. One, I'm not. I'm both tragically single and open to anyone. Two, who cares if I were? Three -" he smiled, just like Yuri taught him, "- everybody's got a butt. Although if you somehow don't, _please_ don't send me pictures." 

(Not that he'd admitted he wasn't _straight_ until he met Yuri, but the anonymous horny horde didn't need to know all the details of his life.) 

He sighed and shifted his hips. "But no. I've had a crush on a girl for the longest time." 

From the side, Yuri hissed, "Don't _say_ that!" 

"Oh _no_ ," Dimitri said, dramatically. He sat up, put his fingertips over his lips, and stared into the camera. "Don't worry, dear watcher. I only have eyes for you." 

"What. is. wrong. with. you? I am cutting this whole section _don't pout at me_ I taught you that pout; I'm immune to it." 

The Blue Rose became a whole thing. He didn't realize he was doing it till other people started pointing it out, but he was answering a disproportionate number of questions from them. They were just ... they seemed like a real person. He couldn't explain it. 

"I got, ah, well. I have something special today. I don't normally care so much about color, but I saw this and I had to order it."

He unwrapped the tissue paper and held up a multicolored dildo. It was pale blue at the tip and faded smoothly to a deep, dark blue at the base. The whole thing twisted, like a unicorn's horn. He ran a finger up one of the curves on the shaft. 

"I don't know if it's obvious on the camera, but the whole thing sparkles. So, um," he leaned back, "This one's for you, Blue Rose." 

After, Yuri begged him to stop mentioning the Blue Rose all the time. (Yuri's exact words were, "I'm asking you nicely to stop bringing them up so much." But Dimitri was pretty sure that _was_ begging, for Yuri.) Dimitri backed off, mostly.

But he did, quietly, start answering their messages.

============

Things Dimitri did not think about until - things he did not think about, because the memory was wrapped up tight and shoved deep into a corner:

The first time he had seen guests, there had been two, a man and a woman, both blond, and both familiar somehow. The woman reminded him a bit of a friend from high school. This he knew.

What was lost was that the man had turned at some noise Dimitri made, and Dimitri had seen his face, and panicked. He had leaned against the wall, unable to catch his breath. 

And then he remembered Mercedes's voice, as clear as if she was speaking it now, saying, "Dimitri, if you see something that frightens you, won't you come find me? Or if you see something you can't explain, or that seems impossible? I want you to know that you are safe here. We can have a snack and talk about it. You'll come find me, won't you, Dimitri?" 

"Yes, of course I will." 

"Good boy." 

He'd shaken his head, and turned, and gone to find Mercedes.

============

_now. the last night of winter._

"The Prince suffered with as much grace as he could muster. And eventually the spirits grew bored watching him scream and twist in his chair. 'Ask us to cut your bonds, and we will,' they said, but the Prince said no words. 

"So they made threats, and promises, told him stories of all the things they could do for or to him if he would only beg them to free him. But still the Prince sat, wordless, and the spirits thought on what to do next. 

"The Prince was not sure he could survive this, but he remembered when he told his people he had a plan to save them, how loudly they cheered, and it warmed him in heart, if not in body."

Yuri draws tickets for control of the remote. The only mercy is that Yuri does wait until he's hard again. But then he turns the machine down to just the barest vibration, so Dimitri's left twisting in frustration and desperate for someone with a heavier hand at the controls. 

"Six minutes!" says Yuri. "Incredible. The power of youth, I suppose." Yuri doesn't _look_ any older than Dimitri, but if he isn't at least forty then he's had too much experience crammed into too short of a time. 

(It had not been a pleasant six minutes. Dimitri had tried to push himself up as high as possible to limit how much he had to _feel_ , but his arms had given out. He'd been stuck, impaled, shuddering helplessly while Yuri waxed poetic about his whimpers and cries.) 

"Well, now that he's ready for more, who is going to show our Prince a good time? Remember, no touching except via this." 

Yuri reads out a number, and some cheers go up from Dimitri's left. There's a pause - someone must be coming forward - and Yuri says, "Oh, you're in trouble, Winter Prince." 

The machine slowly shuts itself down over time, and the higher it's set, the more quickly it returns to a lower setting. Yuri and Mercedes had explained this to Dimitri during the test run. This was partially for safety and partially because anyone they gave the controls to was likely to immediately turn it up as high as possible. 

Whoever has the remote now is no exception. The force pops him slightly off the seat. He screams, although more in surprise than anything. 

"Do you like it, Your Highness?" asks a new voice, and Dimitri screams again. He hopes he's imagining things and he doesn't really recognize the voice. If it's really Sylvain, he's never going to be allowed to live this down. He's got to know, right? Would the mask really conceal him from a close friend? 

"I don't think he _does_ like it, Margrave," says Yuri, the words drawn out. Dimitri can imagine Yuri's wicked smile. Dimitri growls. They'd gone through this routine yesterday, for Dimitri to start fighting so the audience could break him down. 

"Is it too much for you, little prince?" says please-don't-be-Sylvain. "Poor baby. Let me turn it down for you." The cock pulls back from _way too fucking deep_ and starts making shallow, fast thrusts. Dimitri kicks his feet in frustration, as far as the cuffs allow him. 

"Oh is that _not_ enough? Do you need it higher now? You're so picky. Why don't you beg and I'll see what I think you deserve?" 

" _Did I say you could come out here?_ " That's a third voice, deep and commanding, and Dimitri points his face at it in shock, suddenly terrified he's done something wrong. 

"No ... no, Your Majesty. I'm sorry, Sir," maybe-Sylvain says, fumbling for words. 

" _Go back to the room. I will deal with you there._ " Dimitri shivers. Who the hell is that? 

There is absolute silence except for the machine whirring and Dimitri's breathing, for about ten seconds. Then Yuri says, "Well, for those of you currently picking yourselves off the floor going, 'What just happened and why am I kneeling?' consider hiring one of our doms. I'm sorry to say _he's_ not available for hire. But there are plenty of other kings, of course. Let's draw another number."

Yuri draws several other numbers. Three minutes with the remote. No touching. (There is at least one "I said no touching!") Feel free to tell him what you wish you were doing with or _to_ him. Whoever makes him come again gets a prize. 

Some people are as bad at dirty talk as Dimitri is (was) but there are others with impressively filthy imaginations. (Most of them seem to involve the Blue Rose, but that's his brand now so he can't blame them.) Yuri gives him enough cues that he knows if he should be responding with anger, or boredom, or desperation. And Yuri fixes the controls in between people, so Dimitri stays hard and eager. 

At some point Yuri must decide things have gone on long enough, though. "Fixing the controls" switches to meaning, "fucking him more intensely." Two people in a row set the vibrations just right. He's close again. 

And Dimitri's getting tired. Yuri's trying to cue him to do something, but Dimitri just leans his head back and moans and hopes the audience likes it. He doesn't have the energy to put on a show. He can ride this cock and keep his body in one piece, but that's all he's got. 

When he comes, it's not a matter of letting go or reaching a peak, or anything so poetic. The machine _makes_ him orgasm, punching it out of him. He has no say in the matter. The machine owns him, and it wants him to come, so he does, with a howling, animalistic cry. He shudders through the aftershocks, and then hangs limp, twitching weakly around the cock still pumping into his ass. 

Mercedes and Yuri are both right. Yuri's right that the audience wants a show. But Mercedes is right that they want honesty. They want him too fucked-out to perform. They want the sobbing, overstimulated prisoner bound to the fucking machine, begging unintelligibly for his freedom. 

Yuri asks the audience to give him a hand, and the applause is deafening.

============

Early in November, in the Red Wolf Moon, he gave the Blue Rose a gift, of sorts.

winterprince: I wanted to send you something as a thank you. For being - well, for being there. For watching all the videos. I know it's nothing you haven't seen but I'm going to delete the picture right after I send it. So you'll be the only person who has a copy. 

He wasn't expecting a response right away, but he got one. 

bluerose: You're still cute. No mask?   
winterprince: No, the mask's at work. 

He'd had a hard time taking the photo without the mask. He'd thrown an arm over his eyes, but then he couldn't see, which meant taking a bunch of shots before he found one that reasonably centered his body.

bluerose: So those are the home bedsheets of the Winter Prince?   
winterprince: yes. not as nice as work, I realize. you'll have to forgive me.   
bluerose: Are you home alone? ;-)   
winterprince: Basically. 

He'd locked the door before he took off his clothes. It was possible Claude would show up, but at least that would buy him a few seconds to get dressed. 

bluerose: Ok. Hold on a second. 

The picture that arrived was of a pair of breasts. No face, but if he wasn't willing to show his, he couldn't really complain. 

winterprince: they're lovely. are they yours? 

He sent the message a split second _before_ going, _What are you saying, you idiot?_

bluerose: Who else would - FINE

Dimitri flopped back on the bed and contemplated how he'd managed to ruin the conversation already, but a second picture arrived. It was of the same breasts, with "HELLO PRINCE" scrawled on them in pen. Presumably by someone looking down to write, since the second E was upside down. 

winterprince: i'm sorry. that was stupid of me. they're lovely. you're lovely.   
bluerose: At least tell me what you'd do with them. 

He stared at the screen, briefly panicked, then began typing.

winterprince: certainly I'd touch them. My hands are fairly large but I think you'd fit them well. To be honest I would probably be hesitant. I'd put a palm against one nipple and slowly close my hand and squeeze.   
winterprince: gently!  
winterprince: and then if you seemed ok with that i'd kiss you. i'd kiss the other one. 

He paused. _This is terrible._

winterprince: is that allright?  
bluerose: yes. go on.   
winterprince: i'd lick your nipple first so i could feel it under my tongue. it would be soft and warm, wouldn't it? i'd close my mouth around it and suck. not hard enough to hurt just enough to feel it slowly harden.   
bluerose: you should do the other one.   
winterprince: i will. maybe I'll put my arms around you so I can hold you closer while i kiss your breasts.   
bluerose: Sweet. Are you touching yourself? 

Dimitri froze, unsure what the expected answer was. 

winterprince: is that ok  
bluerose: omg you are so smooth on camera but you ARE still a dork on the inside! Yes what are we even doing if you aren't jerking off? 

He breathed a sigh of confused relief and put his hand around his cock, then scrolled back up to the Rose's first picture. His phone buzzed with another message.

bluerose: although.

He stopped again. 

bluerose: Only because I can't be there with you. You have plenty of experience touching yourself. If I were there I'd want you to sit back and let me take care of you. 

"Ohh," he whispered. 

bluerose: Hm. Imagine I'm taking you by the chin and telling you to put your hands behind your back. no touching me except with your mouth.   
bluerose: Then I'd kiss you. Then ... my hands aren't as big as yours but I think I can still fit one around your dick. Maybe I'll use both anyway. Sometimes it feels good to touch another person, you know?

If only, although the mental image was amazing. What would she look like, kneeling over him? 

bluerose: How do you feel?   
winterprince: good  
winterprince: really good  
winterprince: i am so hard. duck.   
winterprince: duck  
winterprince: i mean duck  
winterprince: dammit  
bluerose: I KNOW WHAT YOU MEAN  
bluerose: Show me. Send me another picture. 

Dimitri fumbled with the phone for a minute, trying to get a reasonable shot.   
Then he flopped back on the bed. He put a hand over his mouth as he pumped his cock. He should probably try to hold back. Should he?

Another picture came in - a hand disappearing into the waistband of a pair of jeans. 

winterprince: you're teasing me  
bluerose: I have to leave something to the imagination for next time. Besides, you're not supposed to touch.   
winterprince: mouth  
winterprince: you said i could use my mouth  
bluerose: Hm. 

There was a long pause, long enough for Dimitri to think, _I shouldn't have said that,_ before there was another _ding._

The jeans were unbuttoned now, revealing a triangle of white underwear with a tiny pink bow at the top. The hand was closed in a circle, with just the head of the Blue Rose's cock visible. 

Dimitri stopped breathing. At that moment he would have given anything to be in the same room with her.

winterprince: pretty  
winterprince: let me swallow you  
winterprince: let me feel you in my throat  
bluerose: Oh my!  
winterprince: wait no i'm sorry   
winterprince: there's more to you than your genitals i promise  
bluerose: Shut up.  
bluerose: It's fine.  
bluerose: I suppose we'll ignore the logistical difficulties of you going down on me while I've got my hands on your dick.   
bluerose: Sure. That sounds nice.   
bluerose: Your mouth is very warm. Let me run my fingers through your hair. 

Dimitri dropped the phone and shoved two fingers in his mouth. He moaned, slightly muffled, and imagined himself on his knees, mouth full, the hand in his hair tightening its grip. 

Holding back was foolish, and rapidly becoming impossible - 

The doorknob rattled, and Dimitri startled, inhaled sharply, and briefly choked on spit. 

"Uh, Dimitri, are you okay in there?" came Claude's voice, concerned.

"I'm fine give me a minute." Of course Claude wanted to enter his - their - bedroom, like a normal person would. Why hadn't he thought this through? Where were his pants? 

He glanced at his phone and saw the picture on his screen was significantly more naked than the last few. 

Dimitri took a deep breath and tried to pretend he wasn't mortified as he said, "Claude, could you come back in ten minutes?" 

There was a pause, and Dimitri imagined Claude breaking out in a grin, since he said, "Do you have someone _in_ there? I'll give you fifteen minutes. But I really do need my laptop after that." 

"That's fine _goodbye_ ," said Dimitri. He picked up his phone again. The Rose's messages had steadily increased in intensity. As he read, the momentary lapse in his arousal faded. His heart raced as he reached down to take himself in hand again. 

winterprince: sorry  
winterprince: i can't think  
winterprince: you're very pretty  
winterprince: i want to eat you  
winterprince: now ait  
bluerose: shhhh. Do you like what you see?   
winterprince: yes  
bluerose: Then hush. You can send me a picture when you're done to show me how much you liked it.   
winterprince: i wish i could put my hand on your legs they look strong and soft  
bluerose: Hush. You shouldn't be able to talk anyway. Aren't you supposed to have a dick in your mouth?   
winterprince: mmph.  
bluerose: Smartass.   
bluerose: I'm holding your head in place. I don't want to hear another word out of you. And remember I told you to keep your hands behind your back. 

Dimitri put his fingers back in his mouth and groaned as he sucked on them. He dug his heels into the mattress as he stroked his cock. He was close. It was so good. Pleasure curled inside of him. His skin felt extra-sensitive, and he could picture the Blue Rose's hands on his body, her soft voice saying, "Hold still." 

He moaned when he came, and he was suddenly grateful he had his mouth partially covered. He blinked up at the ceiling, panting. He took his fingers out of his mouth and wiped them on his sheets so he could pick the phone up again. Right, she wanted another photo. 

Oh. There was an idea. He swiped two fingers through the mess on his stomach, then opened his mouth, placed his fingertips against his tongue, and snapped a picture of the lower half of his face. 

winterprince: You're delicious, Blue Rose.   
bluerose: omg  
bluerose: Who are you and what - who are you.   
bluerose: Do they teach this in porn school?!  
winterprince: Too much? I found your messages inspirational. 

Another picture appeared. It was the Rose's breasts again, but now they were wet and glistening. The "hello" was smeared. 

bluerose: You'll have to pretend you did this instead of me.   
bluerose: I might need a shower.   
winterprince: Me too i think.   
bluerose: This was fun. I can't promise availability but feel free to ask if you want to do it again sometime.   
bluerose: We aren't dating though. This isn't a thing.   
bluerose: Goodbye for now.   
winterprince: Okay goodbye. 

Oh. That was ... abrupt. Dimitri - no, he did not want to think about this now. A shower was a good idea. He cleaned himself off somewhat with a couple of tissues, threw on a bathrobe and grabbed a towel, and went to the boys' bathroom. 

But in the shower, he couldn't avoid thinking. _What am I doing?_ No, of course they weren't dating. Adults hooked up. That was a normal thing that didn't actually mean anything. She was a fan. All he knew about her were a bunch of non-identifying details and what her body looked like. He didn't even know her face or her voice - 

He realized, with a cold shock the warm water couldn't dispel, that he'd imagined Marianne's voice as the Blue Rose. 

"What am I doing?" he said quietly, and put his hands over his face.


	3. Birthday Presents And Other Wrapped Gifts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A friend has a confession. Another friend has a birthday. A not-friend has an offer.

_now. the last night of winter._

There's an intermission of sorts, and he finally gets a break. They do not let him out of the chair, because the Winter Prince can't get off his throne till morning (or midnight, in the case of the actual show), but they untie each of his limbs in turn and massage them. 

A few other people perform, so the audience isn't stuck watching Mercedes fuss over him. He's not entirely sure what's going on, but there appears to be someone singing a lively song about having sex with outer space? Maybe sex _in_ outer space? There's a second song about ... somebody's dick, which the audience clearly knows and sings along to. 

There's also a drag act, although he only knows what it is because he overheard an earlier argument. The artist had something about roses in their performing name and Yuri wanted them to change it for tonight. Yuri clearly won, because a "Lady Bergamot" takes the stage. 

Dimitri is just grateful for the distraction. He feels like he's had a cycle in an industrial washing machine. He has no idea how he's going to finish out the evening. 

Somebody unbuckles the gag and wipes his face. 

Yuri speaks. "I'm impressed, little prince." Nevermind that Dimitri is half a foot taller than Yuri; he _feels_ shorter around him. "I thought you would have had to tap out by now." 

"I can't do it," Dimitri forces out. His jaw is sore. "I don't need the money. Just let me go." 

Mercedes puts her palms on his lower back. She is, he has learned, an expert at soothing touches, and warmth suffuses him. He probably could do this till morning if she would keep touching him.

"We all think you're doing so well," she says. "Everyone is terribly excited." 

"You need to drink something," Yuri says. "Open your mouth." There's a straw at Dimitri's lips. He takes a sip and coughs. 

"Aaah, this isn't water. What is this?"

"It's some kind of sporty drink; you need electrolytes." 

He closes his mouth and drinks. Mercedes rubs his shoulders. Goddess, her hands are so warm. It's like she's pouring life back into him.

There's a thump and a gasp from the audience, but it's in time with the music, so it was hopefully on purpose. 

Yuri whispers in his ear, "Your Highness, if you need to stop, I promise I will make sure you still get paid." 

Dimitri lets the straw drop from his mouth and says, "No I ... I just need to rest."

"Ok. Keep drinking, then." 

He does. It's too sweet, if he can taste how sweet it is, but it's cold and it's liquid and thus heavenly. 

Mercedes keeps touching him. Unsurprisingly, you build up a lot of tension being _tied to a fucking chair_ and pounded in the ass by the metaphorical concept of winter. But her fingers are practically magic and he feels almost as good as before they started tonight. He'll be able to keep going. And he knows once they really start up all he'll be thinking is _more_.

Mercedes says, "I'm going to push some more lube through. It might be cold. I'm sorry."

(The dildo was the kind with a tube through it so they could keep him oiled up without having to pull him off the machine. And she's right; it feels cold.) 

Yuri takes the drink away. "Ok, enough. Open up again so I can put the ring back in." 

No, no, the gag's too much. Dimitri turns his face away, and says through clenched teeth, "I need another minute." 

"Lorenz is on his last song. I have to narrate the next act."

"Just ... leave it off. I won't talk. My mouth hurts." 

"We don't have time for - _do you want to find out what I'm going to do to you if you don't open your fucking mouth?_ " 

Dimitri gasps at the darkness in Yuri's tone and his cock _leaps_ and Yuri has the ring behind his teeth and is buckling the gag with a speed that's almost dizzying. 

"I'm sorry. I'm sorry. We're in a hurry. Mercedes, he says his mouth hurts. Come help him. Also, don't think I didn't see what your dick did there. You know there are a lot more things we could be doing if that's how you like to play." Yuri pauses, and whispers, "Everybody likes to see royalty laid low." 

_What the hell is this if not royalty laid low?_

Mercedes' hands massage his jaw until it stops hurting. He can do this. 

Yuri kisses his forehead, above the mask. "Make me proud."

============

In the middle of November, in the Red Wolf Moon, Marianne and Dimitri went fake stargazing. This meant they lay on the floor of the piano room with the lights off, staring up at fake constellations made in the ceiling with glow-in-the-dark paint. (It was a project from a previous class, ten or so years ago. Their class had been working on a mural in the attic, sort of a fantastical retelling of the War of Unification with them in the roles of various historical figures.)

"What do you want for your birthday?" Dimitri asked her. 

Marianne thought for a moment. "Hmm ... porn." 

" _What?_ " he hissed, sitting up. 

She quickly waved a hand at him, although she kept staring at the ceiling. "I'm kidding." A pause. "Unless you would really buy me some." 

"I ... well, the internet is, um, right there. But what -" He could hear his voice rising in pitch and fought it back down. "- what are you looking for?" 

Marianne folded her hands on her stomach. "Hmm." She seemed to be seriously considering the question. "Ha. I probably want the confidence to admit that I look at it and not spend an hour working my way up from reading how-to articles or staring at toy websites."

So many things came down to confidence with Marianne. But she'd already changed so much since freshman year, when she would barely speak to people. "What are you afraid of?" 

"I don't know. Maybe it's repression from too many years of religious school. Maybe I still don't believe I deserve to enjoy things." Then she turned her head to look at him. "What does your place make? Anything I should check out?"

No absolutely not ha ha definitely nothing of interest oh goddess no. "I don't know that much about what they make. I'm not usually there when other people are around." 

That was still ... mostly true. They'd asked him if he wanted to do videos with other people - not even sex scenes, really, just demonstrating things on another person. That had seemed like Too Much, though, and they hadn't pushed it. 

Although now that he was thinking back on it, Mercedes had said something like, _Okay, when you're ready_ , or _When you find a partner you're comfortable with_ , or something that implied it was only a matter of time. 

Not worth thinking about now. "Marianne, if you really do decide there's something in particular you're interested in, I can ask. Uh, they seem to do a lot of twin porn. It must be more popular than I realized." 

Marianne sat up, and thankfully her teasing tone was obvious when she said, "Well, let me know if you see any cute boys getting bent over a table." She stretched and grimaced. "We have to get off the floor. My back is starting to hurt."

Dimitri threw up a silent prayer of thanks at the opportunity for a subject change. "Do you think Claude and Hubert are ever going to vacate the basement and let us have the tv again? I miss watching you show me around your village."

"How far are they through the game marathon?" 

"I don't know. Which one's the one with dancing at the ball and the giant spider mech chasing someone on the beach?"

"Oh Goddess, that's barely halfway through the series. I'm just going to go get the Switch. I can play it handheld." 

He almost stopped her, because how was he going to be able to see? But the answer was that they were going to sit next to each other on the couch. She angled her body slightly so she was leaning up against his shoulder. He quietly panicked and tried not to _obviously_ smell her hair. (Which was braided wet and was faintly orange-scented which must be from her shampoo and - _Calm down,_ he told himself. Neither of you are children and she chose to sit like this.)

He thought about putting his arm around her. It didn't even need to be a flirty thing. They were friends enough for it. It'd make sitting easier. 

He did not put his arm around her. 

"Your shirt is nice. Did you design it yourself?" he asked. Marianne's avatar was wearing a black shirt with a unicorn on it. 

(Things Dimitri did not think about until much later: The unicorn's horn was blue, dark at the base and pale at the tip.) 

"Yeah, I like making new things. I changed out one of the bedrooms in my house for a hot-chocolate-after-skiing sort of snowy scene." 

"Do you still have the murder basement?" 

"No," she said. "I put another account on the machine so I could just make a whole weird murder house instead." 

"Oh, cool."

#

He ended up getting her a gift certificate to the fabric store and a promise to accompany her and carry whatever she bought. She told him it was too much money and he told her he had a decent job now, and she said she was going to make him something and he was going to take it or else and - anyway. After the whole friends group went out for the traditional dim sum birthday brunch, a smaller set went to the shop.

Hilda, as the obvious expert (and the owner of the sewing machine) whisked Marianne around the various piles of cloth and made suggestions. 

Claude spent half an hour holding buttons next to a picture he'd pulled up on his phone, before buying exactly three little brown sets. Some LARP thing, presumably.

Dimitri ended up staring at a particular bolt of fabric, and then running his hands over and over the cloth. He still had some numbness in his left hand since the accident - that _he was not going to think about_ because he wanted to have a good day - but he could still feel that it was smooth. It was something you'd wear to feel against your skin and not just because it looked pretty. But it was pretty. It was blue, dark blue, with black twists and spirals, almost an organic pattern.

Hilda came up beside him. "Oh, that is nice, Dimitri. Yes, we'll get some."

#

Marianne made a dress with the blue fabric, with Hilda's help. It had a halter top that tied around the neck, a knee-length skirt, and almost no back.

Marianne smiled politely at Dimitri's strangled, "You look very nice," when she showed it to him. Hilda just laughed. 

A month later, for _his_ birthday, she gave him a tie made of the same fabric. He wore it to holiday dinner with Dedue's family, and everyone agreed it was really quite striking.

============

_now. the last night of winter._

They draw _more_ numbers and tell _more_ tales. One story sticks with him. 

"Hi, I'm Jack and I have more of a _question_ than a story. I'm looking for advice and I think your expertise would be helpful here, Snowy Prince. I know you're preoccupied, but it's just yes or no so I think you can answer."

Dimitri's not the best advice giver under normal circumstances, but there's no way the owner of this (vaguely familiar?) voice cares what he really thinks. 

"See, I have a roommate. And he keeps locking me out of our room. And I assume it is _pretty obvious_ what he's doing in there." There are a few murmurs from the crowd. "And for a while I thought - I'm sick of getting kicked out. I'd rather he just let me in and I could ignore him. But _then_ I thought, I could help him. Cute guy like that, never had a steady partner. I could show him a thing or two."

He's turned the controls way down. Dimitri can feel the vibrations but they're slight, which is something of a relief to his oversensitive body. 

"I know you don't know me, Your Icy Princeliness, but I make it something of a hobby to explore secret places. And a couple of times I've found myself outside our door, fingering my lockpicks and thinking: I could do this. I could open this door. Maybe I could break him open as well. What. Would. I. Find?" 

The vibrations pick up. Dimitri makes a small noise. He should be used to this now, but apparently not. 

"And the funniest thing -" He gives a little laugh with absolutely no humor in it. "- a couple of times I've tried to go hang out in a friend's room, only to find _her door locked too._ " 

Dimitri gasps as the thrusting action turns back on. He has to struggle to keep quiet so he can still hear. It should be a losing proposition, but the voice stops every time he gets too loud.

"So I brought this quandary up to my girlfriend, who has been interested in this female friend for, just - since the moment they met, really. She thinks we should break into the guy's room, tie him up, deliver him to the girl, and then request a nice finder's fee. Maybe a little oral for each of us, from our respective parties of interest."

_Is this Claude? This is Claude, isn't it? It can't be Claude. How would he - Marianne brought Claude and Hilda. No, it can't be. Claude would never._

Exactly like Dimitri would never? Maybe. Dimitri's having a hard time thinking clearly. He keeps trying to get off the chair, only to be surprised that he's chained to it. There's too much dick to focus on anything other than _so much dick._ Maybe once he comes again he'll be able to think. 

... What _would_ it be like for Claude to walk in on him? Probably mortifying. Not really like some, "Hey do you need help with that?" fantasy. 

"However, I have some wagers going about whether these lovebirds will figure things out, so I'm not interested in playing matchmaker. I proposed that we each pick a door and show the occupant what they're missing out on in a real partner. I think my roommate might be more of a slut than he lets on, but I don't know that he's ever let another person properly take him apart." 

Not higher. No, he can't - Dimitri's too close. He can barely hear. 

"Anyway, though. My question, Winter Prince. _When I open your door, should I pretend it was an accident?_ " 

Dimitri can't control himself enough to answer. He can't close his mouth. He can't escape the chair. He can't put his hands over his ears to get away from the story. It's too much it's too much it's too much. 

His orgasm is toe-curling and he is very, very loud. He arches his back and strains against his bonds while it wracks him. It is the most violent pleasure he has ever experienced. He prays for another break after this.

There is applause. 

"Don't drop the microphone like that what are you _doing_!" shouts Yuri.

============

In January, in the Guardian Moon, Mercedes said, "Byleth wants to speak to you!" over one of their teas. "That's terribly exciting."

"Who's Byleth?" Dimitri turned a cookie over in his hand. They were star-shaped this time, cardamom-scented and covered with blue sprinkles. The tea was, as always, slightly too light and presumably slightly too sweet. But he drank it, because he was polite. 

And because the tea was warm. It was always perfectly warm, even to the last sip, a neat trick. Sometimes he imagined he felt it warm in his belly even after he got up to work.

"Byleth is our owner. They're very nice, if a bit stiff. You'll like them." 

"I thought you were the owner." Dimitri knew one other Byleth. It wasn't a common name, but there was no chance _his therapist_ had anything to do with a place that made adult videos. 

"Oh, no," Mercedes said, chuckling, "I'm the manager. Very different." She pushed her chair back and stood. "Byleth said they'd be around in a few hours. Come back here when you're done working."

#

Yuri went relatively easy on him that day. Dimitri was doing a tutorial of sorts on toys under clothing, which mostly meant taking his pants off and on a dozen times.

Yuri told him both to "undress more slowly," and "undress more naturally," which Dimitri protested were incompatible directions. But Yuri eventually seemed satisfied with his physical performance and his commentary and let him show off what the vibrator could _do_.

"Yes, yes, I see your pout. But your desperation is sexy and that's what people are here for. Now they know the Winter Prince is as wound up as they are. Less moaning; you're overselling it."

"Not ... performing ..." 

After, Yuri told him he could keep the shirt. Rather than his own clothes, Yuri had given him a black t-shirt to wear for the video, with "Scarlet Candle Productions" and the image of a half-open door flanked by candles printed on it. (The back said, "Always open.") 

Dimitri folded it - he had put his own clothes on after he showered. "I suppose Byleth didn't want to talk to me just to give me a shirt," he said, half to himself. 

"What about Byleth?" Yuri asked, with an intensity that surprised Dimitri. Yuri had been packing up the camera, but he had stopped to stare at Dimitri. 

"Mercedes said that Byleth was the owner of the - I supposed I don't know if she meant the building or the company. But she said they wanted to speak with me." 

"I'll come with you," Yuri said, quickly enough to nearly cut off Dimitri's last words. "Byleth can be a lot. I'll keep you company."

#

When they got to the office, the presumed Byleth was taking tea with Mercedes, sitting at the same little table Dimitri had drunk his tea at earlier. Their back was to him, but Mercedes waved.

Byleth was drinking their tea black - Dimitri should really tell Mercedes how he liked it one of these days. 

"You don't have to do anything they ask of you," Yuri whispered. 

"Hi. I - _what-_ " Dimitri's voice cracked as Byleth stood and turned, and Dimitri saw their face. 

It could not be Dr. Eisner - wouldn't they have brought it up in a session that they _knew_ but - no? was there any paperwork with Dimitri's name - did he even work here officially - but they'd have to - how - 

"Whoever you think I am, I'm not," Byleth said, flatly. Mercedes stood to join them. 

"Do you have a twin, by any chance?" Dimitri asked, which got a small smile in return. 

"If you like." But Byleth moved on, effectively closing the topic. "Mercedes tells me that you are the new Winter Prince." 

"The new - oh." Yuri put a hand on his shoulder and Dimitri glanced over to him. Yuri smiled, but - Yuri also seemed nervous. Yuri, whose middle name was confidence. "I suppose I wouldn't have been the first, since the mask was already there."

Byleth nodded. "Mercedes also says you've quite taken to the role. We have an offer that you should hear directly from me." 

"Okay." Dimitri said. Yuri made a quiet noise that Dimitri _thought_ was frustration. 

Byleth took a few steps toward Dimitri, heels sinking into the carpet. "The House hosts a party, a show, a ... celebration, when winter turns to spring. It is customary for most of our performers to participate in one way or another. The Winter Prince persona is part of the VIP show." 

"They mean you'd be naked in front of a live audience," Yuri said.

"Yes, I assumed that from 'a show,'" Dimitri replied. 

"Dimitri, dear, don't worry. We can make sure everything is safe for you," said Mercedes. That ... all right _now_ he had a worry, which he hadn't had before she spoke. 

"It is more than what Yuri says," continued Byleth. "The Winter Prince is the capstone of the event. His sacrifice is what heralds the arrival of spring." 

"Uh -"

"You don't have to do this," Yuri said, quietly but urgently. 

"It's his choice," said Mercedes. She smiled at Yuri, but her eyes narrowed. 

"Ultimately," said Byleth, eyes bright but face blank, "we wish to auction off your virginity." 

"Cichol's fucking _tits_ have some tact, Byleth," said Yuri. He started pacing behind Dimitri, muttering angrily. 

"I'm not a virgin," said Dimitri, because he was too taken aback to give the right response, which was something like, "What in the fuck?" 

"That's irrelevant." Byleth waved a hand. "You are untouched by the clients of the House, but are a known figure. That is all that is necessary."

"I ... is that even legal?" 

Byleth considered. "I don't have the slightest idea." They shook their head. "It doesn't matter. The doors are closed to those sorts of consequences." They said it like that meant something Dimitri should understand. How do you not know whether your show is legal? 

Yuri returned and squeezed Dimitri's hand. "You don't have to do it." 

Byleth fixed their gaze on Yuri. "Stop." They turned back to Dimitri, and he was transfixed by their eyes. In his Byleth they were always calming, like staring into a lake. This was like seeing the light glint off a knife. 

Byleth spoke again. "Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd, it is and always will be _your choice_."

"Why do you know my middle name?" he asked, because his mind still couldn't focus on the actual topic and kept glancing around for other options. 

"Dimitri, everything's going to be okay." Mercedes held her hands out to him, smile pulled slightly by the scar on her face, voice full of affection. "Isn't it, Dimitri?" 

"Of course, Mercedes," he said, but - was it? There was a world of difference between fucking himself on camera, or even in front of an audience, and going off with _one person_...

Byleth gently shoulder-checked Mercedes. "You're no better. Dimitri, you can take your time to think about it. And it is, truly, all right if you say no. Someone else can wear the mask at the party." 

"I'm the Winter Prince it's _my_ mask," he said, and the sharpness in his tone surprised even him. 

Mercedes put a hand to her chest and she looked _so pleased_. 

(Things Dimitri did not think about until much later: Would he have accepted the offer if it had come before he'd worked that day, when he was still tense and full of outside worries? Before he'd felt the rush of baring himself before the camera? He couldn't know.) 

Dimitri straightened. "I'll do it only if whoever takes me has to do it on stage. I don't want to have to ... make small talk. They have to become part of the show. I ... I don't even want to know who they are." 

He heard Yuri say, "Fuck," under his breath. 

Byleth crossed their arms, and smiled, wide and predatory. "We can arrange that. Come. Sit. We will discuss further. You two," They glared at Yuri and Mercedes, "should join us, but hold your animosity for elsewhere." 

So they sat. And Byleth went into more details - how the show ran, how the Prince's performance usually played out, what sorts of practice they'd do. Then they told Dimitri what sort of price he was likely to fetch. After that, he knew there was no way he would ever back out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I completely forgot that Dimitri and Marianne were turning 21, but I'm going to assert both that the drinking age is 19 here and that Dimitri and Marianne probably can't drink because of various medications they take.


	4. Preparations

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dimitri is forced to think about the near and long-term future.

In February, in the Pegasus Moon, Marianne said, "I think I'm going to change my major.” 

They were doing the post-dinner dishes. _Dimitri_ was doing the post-dinner dishes and Marianne was keeping him company. They had worked out this division of labor back during their first year. Dimitri had plenty of arm strength and found the physical labor soothing, while Marianne would often be scrubbing pots and pans late into the night and still not get everything fully clean. Usually she'd help him talk through some of his homework, and then they'd wander on to other topics. 

"This late? To what? I thought you loved biology." He wiped his soapy hands on a towel so he could push his hair out of his eyes. 

"I do! But I think I've known for a while that I'm not going to pursue being a vet, and I don't want to work in a lab forever." She absently brushed down the front of her skirt. "And I might keep the bio major if I think I can handle it. But I'm going to switch primarily to poli sci." 

Dimitri dropped the pot he'd just picked up back into the water and stared at her. "Political science? Did your father -"

She held up a hand. "He doesn't even know I'm thinking about it. Although I'm sure he'll be very happy." 

Dimitri shook his head. "I'm sorry. I'm not being very supportive. I'm just surprised." 

"I don't mind, Dimitri. It is kind of weird. But I've been thinking about the kind of impact I want to make on the world, and I think this is the right direction for me."

He regarded her as she looked at her hands. She said, "I'm ok if I need to take an extra year to finish. I'm taking five classes this semester, and I took five in the fall, which should help a little." She smiled up at him. "And then we'd graduate at the same time!" 

True. Dimitri's mental health had demanded too many light load semesters, and he was going to need at least a ninth term, maybe an entire fifth year. As if he wasn't already going to drown in debt.

Marianne could afford to take a fifth year at school. Her father would have no trouble paying for it, especially not with his daughter finally following in his footsteps like he'd always wanted. 

"I think I'm jealous of you, to be honest," said Dimitri. Marianne's face fell, and he threw out a hand to stop her from apologizing. "No, wait, please." He took a deep breath. "I am so happy that you've figured out what you want and that you're pursuing it. Truly." 

He hugged her, impulsively, realizing too late that his hands were wet. But she returned the hug. 

"You'll figure out what you want," she whispered. 

It didn't matter what he wanted. The business degree was to give him some hope of turning the family company around, and maybe some hope of paying off his student loans. Eventually. But ... it didn't matter. This was good news for Marianne.

"Yeah," he said, and he tightened his hold. 

He felt her breath escape with a slight noise, maybe of pain, and he dropped his hands and backed away quickly.

"Sorry," he said, embarrassed. 

Marianne looked slightly red. "Let me, um, get my notebook so we can look at the problems." She left the room. 

_No wait come back was that a good sigh or a bad one?_

She did return, but the moment had passed.

#

Later that night, the Blue Rose messaged him, which was unusual. She sent responses or questions whenever a new video went up, but she almost never just said hi.

bluerose: How are you doing?  
winterprince: Honestly I'm brooding about my life right now. Sorry - I can't really hang out tonight. My roommate is here studying.  
bluerose: No, that's fine. Do you want to talk about the brooding? To a neutral outsider?  
winterprince: I  
winterprince: The 

_How do I word this?_ he thought. 

winterprince: Circumstances forced me to think about the future i want and it bears no resemblance to the future I'm going to have.  
bluerose: What's the future you want?  
bluerose: sorry. i shouldn't be prying. 

Dimitri shook his head and sighed. 

winterprince: It's okay. it's - who are you going to tell?  
winterprince: I think I want to be a teacher, but even if I started trying to pursue that right now, I'd never pay back my student loans. as it is, I'm worried.  
bluerose: Is that why you're doing this job?  
winterprince: Sort of. I used to do tutoring and I really liked it but this pays better. but I like this job. I sincerely do. I like thinking that I'm bringing people enjoyment, and I like being . . . I like feeling wanted for reasons other than family expectations. 

If she asked about his family, he was just going to lie, he decided. But instead she said:

bluerose: That's sweet. Family expectations are miserable. I hope you can work something out.  
bluerose: But I know that's easy for me to say from the outside.  
winterprince: It does help a little. Thank you. 

Dimitri did not want to talk about this more. It was too much baring his heart to a stranger. Well, not a stranger - they talked fairly frequently. About lots of things, sometimes even personal things. But there was an obvious wall between them and she'd said "this is not a relationship" more than once. 

He switched to his photos, where he had a couple of shots he'd been saving just in case. 

winterprince: By the way, did I ever send you this picture? I can't tell if i still have it because i forgot to send it or forgot to delete it.  
bluerose: ... did you blindfold yourself with a necktie?  
winterprince: The mask has to stay at work. And it was a relatively close color match.  
bluerose: It's a nice tie.  
winterprince: Thank you. A friend made it for my birthday. She's taking up sewing.  
winterprince: She made a dress with the same fabric. It's so beautiful. She's really cool. 

Ok, no, this was a bad topic too. 

bluerose: Oh is _this_ the mysterious girl-you-have-a-crush-on?  
winterprince: Ahhh, well, yes. But she isn't - she doesn't like me that way.  
bluerose: That's too bad. I hope she let you down gently.  
winterprince: Oh I haven't asked her out.  
winterprince: I mean  
winterprince: She's not  
winterprince: aaaa  
winterprince: I don't want to ruin the friendship.  
bluerose: Hm.  
bluerose: You might be surprised. What's the worst that could happen?  
winterprince: Well, as I said, I could ruin the friendship.  
bluerose: Suit yourself. 

Maybe he should have just talked about his parents.

winterprince: What about you? Have you ever asked anybody out?  
bluerose: I wasn't in a place to date for a long time. It's funny. I do like somebody in real life, and I think it's mutual, but he's decided he knows better than me about whether we should be dating or not. He thinks he's bad for me or I can't possibly like him or something stupid.  
winterprince: I'm sorry. I hope he gets his head out of his ass.  
bluerose: I _know_. There are much better things I could be putting in there.  
winterprince: Ha ha! Well, that would be quite the opening line for asking someone out.  
winterprince: If you ever get that far and you want product recommendations, you know who to ask. (I am joking.)  
bluerose: Hey something came up. I'm not mad, but I need to walk away for reasons that I hope will be funny someday. 

There was a clicking sound a few feet away as Claude closed his computer and looked around. "Do you hear screaming?" he asked.

============

Of course, to have the show, they had to advertise it.

"... Well, I feel all right going on the record saying you cannot, in fact, use this toy with both hands tied behind your back. So, well played coming up with a scenario so fascinating that I got myself into this mess, foxy_boi_sjg. Also, your username is impossible to pronounce." 

That _had_ to be Sylvain, right? Those were his initials. The only thing that kept Dimitri from being _absolutely_ convinced it was Sylvain was the lack of weird Sylvain behavior in real life. Sylvain wouldn't be able to refrain from bringing it up. If nothing else, there should have been more eyebrow waggling the last time they spoke. 

He tried to shake his head. His hair was falling into his right eye and he couldn't brush it away. "That having been said, if you want to see me helpless like this again, consider commissioning something, hm?"

Because that was the trick, wasn't it? The Winter Prince _did do_ reviews, which were sincere assessments of various toys and equipment. But he also did _reviews_ , or perhaps demonstrations, which you had to pay for. That was really why Yuri had shown up. Or you could get custom scenarios, which you _really_ had to pay for.

The Blue Rose had commissioned a couple of videos of him, tied up and stuffed full. In one he had his wrists bound to his ankles, and lay struggling against a vibe in his ass and two taped to his dick. In the other he had his arms tied over his head as he fucked himself on a toy suction-cupped to the floor. He'd told her in conversation that he liked it, but he wasn't really sure who was the chicken and who was the egg in that exchange anymore. Had he mentioned it and then she requested it, or vice versa? 

(These videos somewhat broke the illusion that he was working alone, since somebody had to be tying or locking or fastening, or at least _freeing_ him after. But Yuri the mysterious and possibly imaginary cameraman had become enough of a running joke that it was probably fine.)

"Although," he continued, "if you're local to our cold little city, you could come and see me be helpless live. Scarlet Candle's spring stage show (all right that's also impossible to say) is coming up and you could be in the audience. Rumor has it that yours truly will be making an appearance. 

"You can look at the website for more information. I personally am quite tired _and_ unsatisfied and I don't care to remember the details at the moment."

#

That night:

bluerose: I'm coming to your show.  
winterprince: Oh! I didn't realize you were local to arianrhod.  
bluerose: Local is relative. But yes, basically. I would not miss this. Not for anything.  
winterprince: It'll be nice to really meet you.  
bluerose: Is there some kind of meet and greet?  
winterprince: Oh, hm, not really. but i can look for you after? you'll need to get vip tickets. i'm not part of the main show.  
bluerose: No, you're doing something strange.  
winterprince: I guess it is strange. there's. I don't know how to say this. there's an auction. but I don't know how people join it.  
bluerose: It's invitation-only, as far as I can tell.  
winterprince: Ah. well, but you know about it then.  
bluerose: Yes. hopefully... well, I hope to see you there. 

Dimitri hoped, too.

============

They had him work one of their smaller parties, to get an idea of what to expect. Not as a performer; merely part of the waitstaff.

Mercedes insisted on feeding him an entire darn meal before he went out, despite his protestations of having had dinner before he arrived. 

"Nonsense, Dimitri," she said, laying out an oven-baked cheeseburger, a milkshake, and potato chips. "It could be a long night, and I don't want you passing out halfway through."

"Isn't there food there?" he asked. "Aren't I handing out drinks and snacks?" He took a sip of the milkshake. It was probably delicious. 

Her expression suddenly turned serious. "Dimitri, do not eat or drink anything inside this House." 

Dimitri paused with the cheeseburger halfway to his mouth. She waved a hand at him and laughed. "Not my food, silly. But people may be eating or drinking, um, interesting things, and you should keep a clear head while working." 

"Oh," Dimitri said, around a mouthful of burger. It was nicely cooked and the lettuce was crunchy, so that was something. Part of him wanted to ask why they were so blatantly lax about getting arrested, but part of him _really didn't._

Mercedes put a hand on his shoulder and said, "You may see some strange things tonight, Dimitri. But everyone in attendance is a vetted guest. Nothing will hurt you. And - you can come talk to me at any time if you need to. Everything will be all right. You're not worried, are you?"

"No," he said, frowning a little. "Just ... curious, I guess." 

"Well, you probably will learn a few fun things tonight. Eat up and I'll pass you along to Yuri so you can get dressed."

#

Yuri turned out to be wearing a floor-length gold dress with a slit in the side that went up to the hip. And heels high enough to bring him eye-level to Dimitri.

"You look ... _amazing_ ," said Dimitri, after staring for a deeply-inappropriate amount of time. 

Yuri put a hand over his chest and smiled. "I know, but I appreciate the sentiment anyway. Let's get you dressed." 

Dimitri's uniform was somewhat less dramatic - black shoes and trousers, a white dress shirt, a blue vest with a silver lion embroidered on the breast pocket. 

"Hm. Our fencing team's the Blue Lions, you know," Dimitri said. 

"Yep, of _course_ it is. Before you go out there - it's a masquerade. You're going to see people you think you recognize, but _no you don't._ "

"Okay," Dimitri said, as he put on the Winter Prince mask. _There will be no politicians or professors at this party, check._

Yuri put on his own mask - feathered, with rhinestones along the nose that gave it a bit of a beak-like shape. "Also, this is important. If anyone takes an interest in you - which is unlikely since the waitstaff is basically invisible - tell them you're still apprenticing and are unavailable for hire."

"For hire? What - never mind. I know what you mean." 

Yuri shook his head. "You truly do not, but - it'll be fine. Just -" Yuri put his hand down sharply, palm out. "- if anything too weird happens, find me. This is a restricted costume, so you'll know it's me if you see it." 

Dimitri unconsciously took a step back. "Yuri, you're making it sound like some horrible fate is going to befall me downstairs." 

Yuri stared into Dimitri's eyes, and with an intensity that was more than a little intimidating, said, "Not on my life." 

Then he held out his hand and said, "C'mon, kid. Let's go see how entirely-too-rich people waste their money."

#

The house had two basements. Dimitri had been to the smaller one to do laundry. The washing machine and dryer were fairly industrial, but it was otherwise a normal basement - slight musty smell, furnace, water heater, miscellaneous tools on the wall.

The second basement, down a back staircase that he'd never really paid attention to, led to the party space. 

There was a thick, soft carpet, likely good for walking on barefoot (as plenty of guests were.) Colored globes of light hung from the ceiling, bright enough to see by but not so much as to feel harsh. One wall had a bar and signs for the restrooms. Another had a series of numbered doors, and a third had a sign saying "Staff Only" and metal doors implying a restaurant kitchen behind them. 

The center of the space contained couches and ... other furniture. Dimitri thought it was funny that Marianne's first guess had been correct - it _was_ a sex club. It was just a lot more than that as well. 

(Things Dimitri did not think about until much later: This space was too big for the footprint of the house, and the ceiling was very high for a basement.) 

Yuri brought him into the kitchen and handed him off to Mercedes. She was giving instructions to another young man in a uniform similar to Dimitri's. Once he left, she turned to Dimitri. 

"Don't you look lovely?" she said, taking his hands and patting them. "Did you do his makeup, Yuri?" 

"I haven't done it in months. It's all him." 

Mercedes cooed over him for another minute. Then she handed him a tray of bacon-wrapped somethings and a pile of napkins, told him to have fun, and sent him out into the fray.

#

Handing out food and taking drink orders was a relief, because it gave him something to do other than _stare._ A fair number of the guests were clothed, but plenty more weren't, or were wearing things he wasn't sure counted as "clothes."

Somehow he'd assumed people would out into the numbered rooms for sex, and not just, er, interact out in the main room? This was clearly untrue - a man waved him over and took two drinks from him. "I've gotten you a glass of wine too, for when you're done," he said, to the man kneeling before him and sucking his dick. The man on his knees moaned, and Dimitri didn't stick around to find out if it was related to the wine. 

There was a, for lack of a better word, _heap_ of half-dressed people who seemed very excited to see him. They emptied his tray of tiny cakes and tried to pull him in to join them. He escaped mostly unscathed, but the tray was a loss. (Later he'd see them spanking each other with it.) 

It was all profoundly strange. It wasn't bad. Everybody seemed to be having a good time. Even the guy who was hanging upside-down in a straitjacket seemed _really into it._ But something was too weird and he couldn't tell what it was, and it was slowly driving him crazy. 

Yuri had said Dimitri might see people he recognized, but _everybody_ felt vaguely familiar. He hadn't been drinking, but it was like something was in the air. Where was Yuri? Maybe he should take a break upstairs. 

He did not see Yuri. Instead he saw Hilda, in a black dress pushed up around her waist, riding some tall blond guy who was laying on one of the couches. 

That - it couldn't be. But who else could it be? Even with a mask on, who else had long pink tails like that? And he thought he recognized the necklace she was wearing. 

And then she laughed, and he absolutely knew that laugh, and anything Yuri had said about not confronting people went right out the window. 

"What are you doing?" he hissed, as he walked up to her. 

She turned her face to him slowly. Her mask was a sleeping green dragon, coiled around her eyes. "Can I get another Noa daiquiri? Hey, you down there. Do you want anything?" The figure on the couch shook his head no. 

"No, I - does Claude know you're here?" Yuri was going to kill him for bothering the guests but Claude was his _roommate._

"Ugh! Why would I care what Claude thinks? I'm here with my _wife_ who's having a great time over there somewhere." She waved, absently. Then she reached out and took his chin, too fast for him to back away. "Oh, are you new, baby? You've gotta learn to stop making assumptions. Go get me my drink." 

Dimitri sputtered for a moment, and then the man on the couch put a hand on his wrist. His chest was heavily scarred, an X cut into his right breast and the remains of a puncture wound near his left shoulder. His mask was a lion, and there was only one eyehole cut, for the left eye. 

"Don't worry about it, Dimitri," he said, and there was something _wrong_ about his voice, and Dimitri shuddered and all the hair on his arm stood on end. Something was wrong with the man's voice and he didn't know _what_ but it was wrong, it was _wrong_ and - Dimitri fled. 

He had to find Mercedes. She would give him a cup of tea and a cookie and help things make sense. He didn't want any more _food_. Where was Yuri? No, he promised Mercedes he had to go to the kitchens - 

\- He crashed into someone. 

"I'm sorry! I'm terribly sorry!" Dimitri said, backing up. 

"Oh, you're quite charming, aren't you?" The man he'd smacked into had bright green eyes, a gold robe, and a deer mask with antlers that looked real. "What's your rush?" 

"I - the kitchen. I have to get - a - a thing." 

"Oh. Well, I was about to retire for the evening. If you'd perhaps be interested in showing me to my room, I could get you off of work early." 

Crud. Was that an invitation, or not? "I'm still an apprentice," Dimitri said, hoping that would mean something to the man. 

"So you're new then?" The man smiled. It was a nice smile, but Dimitri had seen a lot of sharpened smiles in the last few months. "Some people would consider that a perk." 

"I'm sorry, I mean I'm not allowed, I -"

"Khalid, _please_ stop trying to get the staff in trouble." Another person appeared and took the deer-man's arm. He was purple-haired but clearly too tall to be Yuri. He looked at Dimitri, his mask covered in red roses. "I am so sorry. I have let him drink entirely too much, and it has made him ridiculous." 

"I'm not ridiculous! Look how pretty he is!" 

"They're _all_ pretty." 

"But this one's an apprentice! He's an unspoiled wilderness! Let me strip-mine him!" 

"Your metaphors have become _terrible_. Bed. Now. Water and then bed." 

The purple man started to drag the gold man away, then briefly returned to stuff something into Dimitri's breast pocket. "I am _so_ sorry." 

Dimitri stood there in shock for twenty seconds, and then Yuri mercifully found him. 

"Having fun?" 

Dimitri took a deep breath and held it. Then: "It's so strange here."

"Yeah. Yeah it is. Takes a lot of getting used to." Yuri took a sip of his drink, which was glowing. "Do you want to go home?"

"I'm not sure _what_ I want." 

Yuri nodded. "I know I've said this before, but you don't have to do this. Not any of it. Not this, not the show. You don't owe the House anything." 

Something about this had been bugging him, and Dimitri finally realized what. He narrowed his eyes. "Why don't you want me to do the show? Or ... why don't you think I _could_ want to do the show?" 

Yuri looked genuinely angry. "Come with me." 

He led Dimitri into the restroom, where he put his drink down on the sink counter, spun impressively quickly, and ripped off Dimitri's mask. 

"What are you doing? What if someone sees me?!" said Dimitri, trying to simultaneously put his hands over his face and check if any of the stalls were occupied. 

"No one cares what your face looks like, Dimitri! Tell me again." 

Dimitri dropped his hands. "Tell you _what_ again? How much have you been drinking, Yuri?" But Yuri didn't seem drunk. He seemed sober and deadly serious, with possible emphasis on the "deadly."

Yuri spoke slowly. "Tell me you want to do the show." 

Dimitri shrugged to cover his annoyance. "I want to do the show. And I'll ask you again. Why do you think I can't possibly want to do it?" 

Yuri looked down at Dimitri's mask and flipped it over in his hands a few times. "But if it's not the mask then what ...?" he muttered. 

Then Yuri snapped his head up and looked directly into Dimitri's eyes. "I don't want you to feel _coerced._ I know how much money Byleth offered you. It's enough to make a kid agree to something they really don't want to do."

"I'm not a _kid_ , thank you." 

"No, you're -" Yuri put a hand over his eyes for a moment, "- no, you're not. I'm sorry. I just don't want you to think you need to do this. You have a life out there." 

Did he? He had a ton of debt, an uncle with whom his relationship was indifferent at best, a major he hated, a friend he was too cowardly to do anything other than pine after - Well, he had the friend, and several others besides, and this job, and ... and a lot of questions about the future he needed to answer. 

In here, he had an audience. And the Blue Rose said she was coming to his show.

"You're absolutely right, Yuri. I don't need to do this. I want to. I'm doing it because I want to. I like showing myself off. I like taking requests. I like reading my messages and answering questions on the videos. I like knowing I'm making people happy." _I like doing something that nobody expects of me._

Yuri opened his mouth to say something, but Dimitri cut him off. "I know. This is different. This isn't behind a camera. I still want to. Even with someone else. I want to. I want to know everyone in that audience is hoping to be _the one._ " 

Yuri shook his head. "The Winter Prince was the right mask for you, I suppose." 

At the end of the night, Yuri had Dimitri turn out his pockets and changed the ribbons and coins and papers people had been giving him for actual money. It was a stupid amount. Yuri was right that these were entirely-too-rich people.

#

The next day, he asked Marianne, "Hilda wouldn't cheat on Claude, would she?"

Marianne looked at him aghast. "No, why?" 

"I thought I saw her with someone, but it was probably nothing." 

Marianne shrugged. "She might have been on a date. They are poly. I guess that's not a preventative against cheating, but it's probably fine?"

"I'm not even sure it was her, really." _She said she was there with her wife. What wife?_

============

The week of Dimitri's live debut, Marianne said, "Come with us. We're all going out on Friday."

"You and Claude and Hilda? Where are you going?" Friday was The Show but he didn't need to be there to start getting ready till nine. If they were doing dinner or something he might have time to join them for an appetizer. And then pretend to get sick and excuse himself, maybe?

"A burlesque show!" she said, brightly. "Or something in that vein. There are going to be drag performances and dancing and storytelling and 'live demonstrations.'" She waved her fingers like she was finishing a magic trick. "It was advertised as a night of revelry to celebrate the defeat of winter and the arrival of spring." 

Fuck. Fuck! Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck. She had to know, right? If she knew about the show then she knew where the show _was_ which meant she had to know it was at _his_ job which - wait. Maybe she didn't know. Maybe this whole thing had been Claude's idea. 

"Oh?" he said, as lightly as possible. "That sounds fun. Where did you hear about it?" 

She folded her arms and smiled at him. 

"Fuck," he said, and then winced, because that one had been out loud.

She punched him in the shoulder, gently. "I can't believe you didn't tell us your weird fake hotel sex club was putting on a show." 

He did not have an excuse. He put a hand on his cheek, which was already growing hot. "I'm working Friday night."

"Oh no. You're on cleanup for this?" She made a face. "That can't be fun. I hope they're paying you overtime." 

"They are," he lied. Was he lying? 

(Things Dimitri did not think about until much later: If she knows about the show, she's been on the website. How much of the website has she seen?) 

(Things Dimitri did not think about until much later: What is the name of her island?) 

"Maybe we'll see you there, then?" she asked.

"I'm likely to be pretty busy, but maybe? If it doesn't work out I would love to hang out later in the weekend." _If I can walk._

They wouldn't see him, though. The storytelling and the dancing were upstairs, at the normal show for normal people. He'd be downstairs, in the non-obvious basement, at the VIP show. 

"Great," she said, and smiled, and he almost broke down and told her.

============

Here is a thing, and I am breaking from my role as detached narrator to tell you this, because I think it is important for you to understand. Someone is banging into a closed door as we speak because I am not paying attention to open it, but this context matters.

He has spent several months thinking, "She has to know I'm not just cleaning the place, right? But how can I tell her? What will she think of me?" 

She has spent several months thinking, "He has to know it's me he's talking to, right? Why did I let it go so long without telling him?"

And she has dropped progressively more obvious hints into his lap. But he is deeply invested in the idea that they are Just Friends, because that allows him to avoid the potential of being rejected. And so he cannot conceive of the idea that his mysterious fan is less mysterious than he might imagine. Or that his shy friend from freshman year is no longer so shy. She would have to drop _herself_ into his lap for him to realize at this point. 

And she could do this, but the Rose _told_ the Prince to confess his affections, and he can twist in the wind until he gets over himself. (Or until she cracks and snaps at him to go to her room and take off his pants, which is a small but ever-growing possibility.) 

All right, then. Pretend we did not speak directly. I have business to attend to; I think there is a Byleth who's snuck in.

But also ... know that I care about happy endings, inasmuch as it is in my power to achieve them.

============

The house was lit up when he arrived, covered in red holiday lights. It did look sort of like a scarlet candle, he supposed.

He slipped inside via the side door. There were already people around. Some he recognized in passing as other performers, but some were presumably guests. Still, there were many familiar faces. He thought he saw at least one person from school but, well, that had always been a risk. 

"Are you nervous?" Yuri asked, when he came to collect Dimitri for the VIP show. 

"No," he said. He was freshly showered and made up to stop hearts. The cuffs were a comforting pressure against his wrists and ankles. The robe was smooth and cool on his skin. He felt divine. The crowd was going to go wild with desperation for him. 

Dimitri picked up the last piece, the mask - snow at night - and tied it on. He sighed as darkness settled over him. 

"I'm ready for my destiny, Yuri," said the Winter Prince, holding out a hand. 

"Oh boy," Yuri said. "All right, Your Highness. Let's go."


	5. The Coming Of Spring

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's the end of the show.

And then, suddenly ... it's time. Yuri is going to draw a number. Someone is going to win the final prize. 

Yuri speaks the final part of the fairy tale:

"As the morning approached, the Prince lay drained of energy and near death. And the spirits, who as we have said previously had no intention of honoring their bargain, began to argue amongst themselves as to who had most earned the right to kill him. 

"But. The Prince had known the spirits were wicked and could not be trusted, and his plan had never been to rely upon them playing fairly. It had only ever been to distract them for the night. Because Spring had been waiting at the edges of the kingdom for some time, and with the spirits playing games in the throne room, Spring was finally able to arrive in the land. 

"And those spirits of snow and ice, of wind and darkness, faded to nothingness as the kingdom awoke to Spring. 

"And then the Prince was truly alone, wondering what sort of Spring it was to be."

(And thank the Goddess that's the story, both because Dimitri is toast and because the machine is finally _off_.) 

All that remains is the question of what Spring will do with him when it approaches his throne. 

Yuri reads a number aloud. With how weird the night has been, Dimitri is expecting something meaningful - his birthdate, his ID number - but no, it's just a random string of digits. Spring could be anyone. 

There's a pause, and then a cheer from one side of the room. 

Yuri says, "We have a winner! Hello! Oh, what lovely hair. I suppose we don't need to ask your name. He's all yours, goddess of spring. How should we arrange him for you?"

A pause, and then: "Still on the throne? Hm, kinky. Mercie, can you?" 

Dimitri's ankles are unfastened briefly, then clipped again to the feet of the throne so he's in a more natural sitting position. 

"Have fun, dear," says Mercedes's voice in his ear. She moves his arms too, binding them fully behind him. Now he has no leverage whatsoever. If the bearer of the banner of springtime wants to turn the chair back on, he's going to take the full force of whatever they do. 

"Well," comes Yuri's voice, "we are at last at the finale of our performance. Some of you must be disappointed not to be chosen. The bar will give you a free drink, should you wish to drown your sorrows. Or the reception desk is open upstairs, should you wish to find a companion to drown your sorrows _with_. Just because this Winter Prince can't be yours doesn't mean there isn't an ex-Prince to catch your eye."

There are quiet footsteps, that he can just barely hear under Yuri's voice. Spring approaches. Spring has always meant flowers and warm weather and good things. But if you're winter, he supposes, it means death. 

Yuri continues, "All right, I know half of you monsters are going to leave now that you don't get to rail somebody so I'm doing the credits first. Please give a cheer for the Black Metal Eagles, our in-House band!" And there is a cheer, of a mostly-happy crowd satisfied by the performance so far. 

He speaks quickly, clearly trying to get everything out before the room clears too much. "Mercedes von Martritz is our healer and safety expert. Annette Fantine Dominic sang some deeply inappropriate songs for us. Kudos for trying to rhyme 'phallus' and 'Fraldarius' by the way. Lady Bergamot did our halftime show; she normally performs as The Rose Princess and is staring daggers at me from the bar make sure to tip her even if your drink is free. Tempest-92 was _not_ supposed to be part of the show but he came here and scared the shit out of half of you anyway. I would not like to be his pet tonight!" 

Yuri stops for a second and inhales loudly. "I am the astronomically fabulous Yuri LeClerc, leader of the Ashen Wolves, the Savage Mockingbird, and teacher of sixteen different classes at this fine facility! The House at Red Candle's Light stands against the darkness for another year! Give a big round of applause to the newest former Winter Prince and let's get on with the damn show!"

There are cheers and yells and whistles, and none of it matters because a hand touches his cheek and a voice that sounds like he has always imagined says, "I have been waiting for this for a long time." 

She sits in his lap - no, she straddles him. Bare legs bracket his. For a moment he thinks she's naked, but he feels cool, smooth fabric press against his chest as she puts her arms around his neck. More fabric falls over his knees. A dress, then, or a skirt and blouse. 

Her touch is electric. He believed, after the evening he'd been having, that he couldn't possibly want to be touched. But he's wrong. He's so wrong. Goosebumps break out on his skin and he shivers in pleasure. He tries to lean into her, straining to push himself forward even though he's trapped. 

She kisses his neck, softly at first and then rougher. She places sucking, biting kisses that seem like they should hurt, but he feels no pain. He bares his throat and moans encouragement. More. He can take more. He needs more. 

_Please, Rose. Please._

Can it be her? What's the likelihood of that? It doesn't matter. He can't see who it is. He can't know who it is. So she's the Blue Rose to him. 

She pushes back, and Dimitri whines at her absence. There's a rustle of fabric, and a whistle, and Yuri saying, "Oh, hush, you." Then there's warm skin pressed against his mouth. He breathes in her scent. Goddess, she's so soft. He licks her, and her nipple pebbles under his touch. She is perfect, and he flexes his wrists in desperation, trying to reach her. But his mouth is all he can use, and he moves his tongue as best as he's able - a slow circle, a flicking pressure. 

When she pulls her breast away he whines again, high-pitched and frustrated. he shakes his head and she shushes him, brings her other breast to his lips. She runs her fingers through his hair as he sucks. The ring won't let him nibble, and he suddenly hates it with a burning passion. 

"You've become very needy very suddenly," she says. "This isn't about you." He whines again, muffled. 

"Don't worry. It's sort of about you, to be honest. But be good for me." He rubs the flat of his tongue against her skin. He needs her to touch him. _Anything, please._ He is so hard. Fuck. He thought it would take a miracle for him to have any more energy, but she is a miracle in herself. 

She leans back, leaves him bereft _again_. He thinks he's going to cry from frustration, but she hooks her fingers under the straps on the gag and twists until the ring pops out from behind his teeth. Dimitri sighs and starts to thank her, but she drops the gag to fall around his neck and kisses him before he can get the words out. 

And maybe she's a bit desperate too, because she kisses him harshly, fingers twisted in his hair. It's clumsy and messy and he doesn't care _he doesn't care_. She opens his mouth and slides her tongue against his and he groans in something close to bliss. 

Then she puts a hand on his cock and strokes him in firm, fast movements, and that _is_ bliss. 

She breaks the kiss with a slight pop, and says, "I had hoped so desperately to touch you for real." 

"Who are you?" he croaks, voice rough from earlier screaming. 

She stops her hand, and laughs. she puts her cheek against his, and he gets a faint scent of orange from her hair as she whispers, "I'm a dark feeling in an unreal place." 

That _means_ something. Someone said that to him once. When? 

"I'm sorry," he says. "I'm not at my best for thinking right now." 

She sighs, and says: "I sent you a picture of my boobs with HELLO PRINCE written on them." 

He drops his head onto her shoulder. "Thank the goddess it's you." 

She pats him on the cheek. "You're a fool, but I suppose I have no right to judge. I need you to do something for me, Winter Prince." 

"Anything. Anything, Blue Rose." 

"I want you to confess to that crush of yours. Stop trying to decide how your friend should feel and just talk to her. Or Goddess help me I will turn your throne all the way up and just watch the inevitable." 

"I ..." He pauses, trapped emotionally as well as physically now. 

(He will not later be able to say why _the scent of orange_ is the detail that finally breaks through, as opposed to her voice, but all that matters is that something does.) 

He speaks, haltingly. "Marianne, I like you. I don't just mean that as a friend. All I want is to put my arms around you and, well, a lot more than that. Your friendship is one of the best things in my life, and I've been afraid that we wouldn't be able to go back to friendship if you weren't interested. But now I think I've been wrong about everything." 

"Good," she says. "Tell her just like that." 

He shakes his head. "No, Marianne. _Listen to me._ " 

There is a long, uncomfortable pause, and a quiet, "Oh my. How ... how long have you known?"

"About thirty seconds." 

There's another long pause, and then she laughs, and it is so clearly Marianne's laugh now that he knows. "I guess ... we have a lot to talk about later. But I've won a very rare prize and I want to make use of it. Hush now, Dimitri. Let me take care of you." 

"But Marianne, I -"

"Do you want me to touch you?" 

"More than anything." 

"Then hush." She tugs the gag up and pushes it back in his mouth. He makes a questioning noise. "No, I know you. You're going to work yourself into some kind of angst spiral. No talking." 

She doesn't touch him for a moment and he's left wondering what's coming. Then he feels vibration as the chair activates. The dildo thrusts deep, he grunts, his back stiffens - 

"Too much?" she asks, and he nods, rapidly. The machine slows down until it's something approximating a gentle roll. "Better?" 

He nods, slower this time, with a distorted, "Uh-huh." 

"Sorry. Everyone else got to play with the remote and I wanted to as well. But I do want you to enjoy this." 

She kisses his neck again, moves down to his chest, and starts playing her fingers over his nipples. He groans at the sensation. It's so good but so _strange_ having her perched over him while he's being fucked. All this time, all these months, he's spent alone. Watched, maybe, but untouched. She is so warm. So solid and real. He's afraid for a moment that he's going to cry and she'll think it's from sadness. 

"You're always so worried about everything. And of course you are. But I wish you'd let me help you more. Just ... relax and let me take care of you." 

She sits back down, and oh, she isn't wearing underwear. He didn't realize. She rolls her hips forward and rubs her body against him. Rubs her length against his. He flexes the tiny amount he can move, trying to match her. Finally, they're in the same place and he doesn't have to imagine what she must feel like. She squeezes his thighs with hers. Her legs are strong, from a lifetime of horseback riding lessons. He sighs, and hopes she can tell how happy he is. 

There's a clicking sound that must be something being opened. 

"Of course I'd be lying if I pretended I weren't _dying_ to touch you. You don't know how turned on I've been all night watching you tied up like this. Watching _everyone else_ play with _my prince._ "

The possessiveness in her voice makes something burn hot and bright within Dimitri. He's stopped fighting against the cuffs. He's Marianne's now, and all he wants is to feel whatever she's going to do next. 

Something clatters to the ground. "Eh. Oh well. They'll have to clean anyway." The skirt is pushed aside, fabric brushing over his stomach, and slick hands spread lube over both of them. Dimitri shivers. 

Quietly, Marianne says, "Ha. I guess I do need both hands, in the end." 

She holds both of their cocks together, and Dimitri groans as she starts sliding her hands up and down. She's gentle at first, but that lasts only a few seconds before she speeds up. She's seeking her own pleasure as much as his, bucking her hips and pushing herself closer to him.

Her words are clipped and breathy when she next speaks. "You don't - you don't know how much I've dreamed of touching you. I've been so close to just bursting into your room and telling you to take your pants off. Or just texting you and saying come downstairs, it's me, it's me - ah - ah -"

Nothing matters except that she's here with him. Maybe the audience is still there. Who knows. Who cares. 

He hears her breaths, quiet, pretty gasps and hitched noises. He's never heard her. All this time and he's never actually gotten to hear her coming undone. And he still can't see her. Fuck. Why did he insist on being blindfolded? 

He doesn't have the mind to really be upset, though. The machine is _still_ going, albeit slowly, and between it, Marianne's hands, and the wildly lewd noises she is making he is having to hold himself _back_ from an orgasm he absolutely did not think his body had left in it .

Marianne cries, "Goddess. _Oh -_ " and cuts off. Her hands slip. Her motions stutter. The gasps turn to a moan and he thinks he could not be more in love. she rocks and shakes and collapses into him, whispering his name into his chest.

And then he's gone, too, lost in pleasure, breath torn away. He sees sparks behind his closed eyelids, stars in the darkness, fireworks at the end of the festival, snowflakes tossed in a storm at night.

============

He must pass out, or something like it, because the next thing he remembers clearly is the mask being lifted and Yuri's concerned face looking down at him. Dimitri blinks up at him, and Yuri breaks out in a smile.

"You made it. You're done." 

Everything is starting to hurt, now that he's coming back to awareness. His joints are sore and his wrists feel raw. His _bones_ hurt. His jaw aches, although the gag's finally gone - he's going to burn it if he ever sees it again. His midsection is starting to register a number of complaints, and he doesn't want to think about trying to walk. He is also utterly, helplessly exhausted. 

Thankfully, he seems to be lying down. He's on the floor, head and shoulders in Yuri's lap. His robe's been thrown over his body. Yuri rubs Dimitri's jaw, and he leans into the touch. 

"How do you feel?" Yuri asks. 

"Terrible," Dimitri says, weakly. 

Yuri nods and pets his hair. His scalp doesn't hurt. That's something. "I'm not surprised. It's a long night, Your Majesty." 

"Don't mock me. I'm ... I'm cold." He is suddenly freezing. 

A blanket lands on him with a soft _foomph_ and Mercedes appears in his vision. "That's to be expected. Rest here for a few minutes and we'll get you upstairs to bed." 

Bed, yeah. Laying on something flat and soft and never moving again ... "No! Wait. Where's Marianne? I have to see her." 

Yuri doesn't pretend ignorance. "Everybody's gone home to their lives. She's wherever she is. Your dorm or whatever, I assume." 

"Let me up," says Dimitri, struggling and mostly failing to move. "I need to go home." 

Mercedes puts a hand on his shoulder and says, firmly, "You should stay the night and rest. You'll feel better in the morning." 

Dimitri pushes her hand off. "No! I have to go home! At least ... at least let me go home and die in my own bed." Somehow he's afraid if he sleeps in this place he'll wake up and find a hundred years have passed. 

"Oh dear. You're not going to die, Dimitri." 

"Shh, shh," says Yuri, continuing to pet him. "Let me handle this." 

Yuri convinces her. Yuri doesn't lose arguments, Dimitri has learned, and this is no exception. They talk in hushed, harsh tones, but the conversation ends with a final: "You know it has to be his choice to return or not. Fix him so I can send him home."

"Suit yourself, Yuri," Mercedes says, clipped. She flips up the blanket and robe, puts both of her hands on Dimitri's stomach, and there is a _light_. And ... Dimitri doesn't feel any less tired but he stops aching. He feels a thousand times better, instantly.

Sure, sure, of course. The house is too easy to get lost in and there are secret twins and he keeps hearing voices that sound familiar, and he went to high school with an Annette Dominic - it might as well _actually_ be magic.

"What are you doing?" snaps Yuri.

Mercedes smiles at him, sweetly, and now that it's not pointed directly at Dimitri, he can see the way it's a weapon. "I'm letting him make his own decisions. He won't be content to stay away, and I want him to understand that we can keep him safe."

"You know the Winter Prince doesn't always return," Yuri says, carefully. 

Mercedes crosses her arms. "And you know this one will." 

_No, no, stop talking about me like I'm not here._ "I need ... I need to take a shower," Dimitri says. He gets into a sitting position, more by force of will than anything else. 

"All right," says Mercedes. "I'll go make you a cup of tea so you have something warm to drink when you come out." 

"I don't take milk in my tea!" bursts out of Dimitri suddenly. He's too tired to be anything but brutally honest. "I'm sorry. I don't know why I've never said anything. I don't even drink black tea." 

Mercedes looks suddenly stricken by a terrible affliction, and Dimitri turns to see that it's being caused by Yuri's murderous expression. "You know how he takes his tea. The tea. Of course it was the damn tea. _What have you done to him?_ "

Mercedes straightens, her expression turning cold. "Do you know how many of them I used to have to try before I could turn one over to you? All that time I spend carefully shepherding them down empty hallways, stripping pictures out of their messages, begging the House to stop popping them into the reception desk? They see one wrong face - sometimes their own, and sometimes a friend's - and they panic, and they're gone."

She shrugs. "So I simply requested he find me first, should he end up in that situation." 

Yuri is shaking. "Go away, before I decide it is worth enduring Byleth's wrath." 

"You know I'm right. But suit yourself, Yuri. And Dimitri - since Byleth's not here right now it falls to me to say that the doors are always open to you, whenever it is that you're ready to return. Don't hurt yourself on the way home." 

Yuri doesn't exhale until she's gone, and then he laughs humorlessly. "Come on. I'll help you get to the shower and dress and I'll get you a transport home."

============

He spends the car ride thinking about details. Marianne's island is covered in blue roses. She made a unicorn shirt for her avatar. She _told him_ to ask her out. She had the voice he expected. He looks back through his message history. Yes, there. She called him by name once, and he didn't even notice. Maybe she didn't either.

Eventually, he gets home and stumbles through the front door. He sighs at the staircase. Maybe he can just crash on a couch. He glances around and sees Marianne laying on the floor of the piano room, staring up at the fake stars. 

She is wearing the dress, The Dress, the one she made with his birthday present. The skirt's ridden up over her knees and fanned out around her. Her hair is decorated with roses, pinned up in a crown, dark blue against the bright sky of her hair. She looks like a goddess in a spring breeze. 

He kneels next to her, and she gives him a sad smile. He frowns, then lays down and puts his arm over her waist. 

"I'm sorry," he says.

"For what? What are you sorry for? I -"

"Because I didn't know it was you. _I didn't know it was you, Marianne._ And I don't understand how I didn't see it. I'm such an idiot." 

Marianne speaks, slowly at first but speeding up as she talks, her voice gaining a squeaking edge. "I ... did think the first message was fairly obvious. For a while I - um, this is embarrassing, but I thought you did know and we just weren't talking about it because it was weird. And then I realized you _didn't_ know. And then for a while I was giving hints and they felt so obvious to me but you didn't react. And at some point I thought, 'He's going to think I'm mocking him when he figures it out.' And - and then I was I was just trying to enjoy it while it lasted but I'm so sorry this was so sketchy of me!" She throws an arm over her eyes. 

Dimitri isn't sure he's awake enough to feel emotions, but he says, "I wish you'd told me." 

Marianne nods. "I'm sorry." She moves her arm and turns to look at him. "I didn't go looking for it, I swear. I was shopping and I found your reviews and I watched like three of them before I made the connection and then - oh Goddess, you must be so angry. I -" 

She sits up, folds her legs like she's going to stand, but Dimitri puts a finger over her lips. "Please don't leave. I think, when I am not so tired, that I will feel some anger about this. But ... mostly because we could have kissed sooner than tonight." 

He moves his hand to her cheek and draws her closer. He kisses her, very gently, and then says, "I need to sleep. I really wish I didn't need to right now, but I can barely move. Let's find someplace more comfortable than the floor, and we can talk in the morning. I'll quit my job and we can figure out where we go from there." 

She frowns at him, confused. "Why do you need to quit? Didn't you just debut?" 

What? "Well, I have a girlfriend now. Er, I hope." 

"Sure, but why would that mean you have to quit? I thought you loved the job." 

"Well, yes, but - this is also a topic for later." 

As she helps him limp up the stairs, a thought strikes him. "How many tickets did you have to buy?" 

She gives a small laugh. "Actually ... one. After we walked around the House and saw what it really was, I just _knew_. You were my Dimitri and it didn't matter how many tickets I bought. Claude bought like three dozen, though."

Oh, Claude. The memory of his monologue comes crashing back to Dimitri. Marianne must see his face, because she says, "Right. Claude says he didn't mean anything he said, and he's definitely staying with Hilda tonight, and if you're too creeped out he'll move, and he's sorry he got caught up in the moment." 

Dimitri raises an eyebrow. "He meant it." 

"Yeah, after that he said, 'But let me know if he seems interested.' And then, 'Uh, but obviously you have dibs.'"

"Ok. Sure. Wait, what did you mean by 'what the house really is'?"

"Oh, um, that's probably also a topic for tomorrow." 

He sleeps like a rock, even though they're crammed together in a too-small bed. He'd sleep well anywhere, with Marianne in his arms.

============

There are negotiations, carried out over a number of months. Mostly Marianne leads them, though with input from Dimitri, of course.

Their primary condition is _never seeing Mercedes again_. But there are other things they care about as well.

The House has long had precedent for people working on an occasional basis. When he thinks about it, Dimitri concludes that he likes getting a break from his life, but not a permanent one. He does still want to make a future for himself.

(He also concludes that the job has not really been about the money for a long time, but this is news to no one except him.) 

There is also a less common precedent for paired workers, and this is the bit that makes things work for Dimitri and Marianne. There are people who lie under the direct supervision - or perhaps guardianship? - of another. As such: 

"I know it's been a while, darlings. You've all been so hungry and lonely. The birds are singing and the grass is growing, but what about you? Where is your precious prince? Did he really die to make the flowers bloom? 

"I've been reading all the messages you've sent. The prince is so flattered by how much you care. Aren't you, Prince?"

Dimitri flutters his eyes open. He makes a questioning noise up towards his captor. 

Marianne smiles down at him. Her mask is full of roses, although not all blue - there are a few in purple and gold for accents. The front of her hair is braided back, but some falls loose over and behind her shoulders. 

She is shirtless, but with blue tape over her nipples. The tape might or might not come off, depending on her mood. Dimitri suspects today will just be about showing him off. 

He is naked, save for the spring-green cord wound around his torso, binding his arms behind his back. (Yuri had tied it, but said Marianne wouldn't need _too_ much more practice. Marianne had decorated it, tucking little flowers in between the loops.) His ankles are also bound, though she's likely to untie those eventually. 

And, of course, there's the mask, which now has a few tiny fabric flowers glued to it. They haven't figured out who he's becoming yet. They've met with the scenario designer (Dimitri thought it sounded like Ashe's dream job and found he was correct) but nothing was firm. No rush. They'd come back - he'd come back - because they'd wanted to. 

"Are you awake now? Did you have a good rest?" He nods, and tries to say _yes_ as well as he can through the gag. "You've drooled in your sleep," she says, swiping below his mouth with her thumb. 

"Sit up and let your audience see what I've done with you."

It's difficult for him to get up on his own, so she slips her hand under the rope on his chest and helps pull him up. She kisses him on the forehead, and he sighs happily. 

She crawls behind him, the lace overlayer of her skirt rubbing against his hip. The skirt is, naturally, also blue, though the lace is black. the stockings are striped, blue and purple to match the mask. they come up over the knee and there is a perfect window of thigh between their tops and the edge of the skirt. 

She is absolutely gorgeous. She is gorgeous no matter what she wears but this outfit is honed to destroy him. He knows somehow he owes Hilda for this, but that's a problem to solve later. 

She pulls him back into her chest, one hand on his throat to tip his face up. She speaks over his shoulder to the camera. 

"Look how pretty he is." She drags a fingernail down the side of his face and he shivers and moans into the gag. He is not acting. "He's here only for my pleasure but I'm going to let you watch."

She pinches one of his nipples and he stifles a laugh. "Oh hush. Do you want me to show them what you look like when you're tickled?" He shakes his head. 

She returns to talking into the camera. "Let me tell you he was well worth the price. All that time he spent stuffing himself full of toys for you? He was so perfect for me. Do you think to rescue him? To get your old prince back? Hm, I don't think he exists anymore. 

"Let me show you what I've done to him, and what I'm going to do to him. See this rope? I had to keep him tied up a lot at first but now it's just how he sleeps."

She puts her hand on his cock. "Some parts of him are unchanged." She gives him a slow stroke, up and down, and he focuses on his breathing to keep himself silent. 

"And this ... she draws her hand in a small circle around the gag. Instead of a simple ball, there's - well, there's a simple ball with a silicone rose attached to the front, so that it looks like the flower's blossoming out of his mouth.

Royal blue. That's the shade, for the rose and the skirt. Royal blue for a prince, even if he's a fallen one. 

"I know you must miss his voice, but I have better uses for his mouth and I prefer to keep him occupied." She kisses his cheek. "That's what you're good for, isn't it?" He closes his eyes and nods again.

Marianne has taken to this like she was born to it. May her father never discover how she chooses to practice her speaking skills. (Although one of her conditions was that nothing they make be available to anyone from home, so it should be fine.) 

She pushes him forward onto the bed, face down. "Ass up, Prince. Spread your knees." He struggles himself into position. 

She pats the curve of his ass. "You may recognize -" He groans as she pulls out the toy stretching him open. She holds it up. It's two shades of blue, twisted like a unicorn horn. "You may recognize this. I appreciated the offering but we've grown beyond it, haven't we, Prince?" He mumbles an affirmative. "And you're not really fit for unicorns anymore." She tosses it over her shoulder and off the bed. Yuri presumably winces but Dimitri can't actually see. 

Now he's on to better and bigger things. That's the phrase, right? 

Dimitri is at a bad angle to really see what she's doing, but he knows she had another toy and some lube under a pillow and she must have brought them out. 

Oh, this one. Of course. He's seen it before. Felt it before. Marianne has absolutely used it to leave him shaking and spent, hand over his mouth to keep their housemates from hearing him. It was a gift from Byleth, custom-crafted, glass, clear with a rosebud and stem surrounded by snowflakes on the inside. 

"Isn't it beautiful? He makes the most beautiful sounds when I'm thrusting it inside of him." He feels the smooth, cool tip against his entrance and his legs tremble. 

"Do you want it?" He nods, as well as he can with his face against the mattress. 

"I can't hear you, my prince." 

He yells into the gag - _Yes, please_. 

"Of course, Your Highness." There's a slight mockery to her tone, but Dimitri knows that's for the camera. 

She's slow. She's torturously slow pushing it into him. It can't be more than thirty seconds but it feels like forever, dragging it in and out, a little further inside each time until it lies full and heavy within him. 

She rolls him over, and he groans, already half-lost someplace calm and pleasurable. 

"You're going to be good for me, aren't you? I don't want you coming too quickly. You know I like to unwind after a hard day with a long ride." 

Dimitri nods, quickly. Maybe he was supposed to be shaking his head. It probably doesn't matter.

"Good, sweet Prince." She is lining up over his cock and he adores her. She has her skirt arranged to hide this from the camera, but he gets to see her, and more importantly, feel her easy slide down onto him. She sighs, and his breath catches. 

Then she looks back over her shoulder. "Oh, _you're_ not invited to this," she says, straight into the camera. 

There's a tiny click as Yuri stops recording. He leaves the room to get the other camera, the better camera for the more expensive videos. He doesn't have to do this - it would make more sense to have both set up and running - but it's a gift to them, this moment alone with each other. 

For a minute they can be Marianne and Dimitri before going back to the Blue Rose and the Winter Prince. 

"You're doing ok?" she asks. "Nothing's too tight?" He shakes his head. "Good." 

And she moves her hips, and he moans, and he doesn't have to think about anything except how lucky he is and how good it feels to do this together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "... what? What?!" 
> 
> Sylvain Jose Gautier - it doesn't matter which one - stares at the screen, dumbfounded. "A paywall _now_?!" He leans back in his chair and tries to catch his breath. "Fine. Fine. I cannot believe in the era of infinite free porn I am going to pay for this." 
> 
> He grumbles and gets up to find his wallet.

**Author's Note:**

> This fic is entirely written and should update approximately once every 48 hours. 
> 
> Thank you again to Spiderlily_Writes, and to Letter and Justy and purple and Quorn and Nat and everybody I kept sending snippets to over the ... six months it took me to write this.


End file.
